MY    QUARTER    CENTURY 
OF   AMERICAN    POLITICS 


CHAMP  CLARK  AS   HE   APPEARS  TO-DAY 


MY  QUARTER  CENTURY 
OF  AMERICAN  POLITICS 


BY 

CHAMP   CLARK 


TWO    VOLUMES 
ILLUSTRATED 


VOLUME  I 


•  •    «       > 


HARPER  &  BROTHERS  PUBLISHERS 
NEW  YORK  AND  LONDON 


•   •      •      •  • 


My  Quarter  Century  of  American  Politics 


Copyright,  1920,  by  Harper  &  Brothers 

Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 

Published,  February,  1920 

B-u 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Chapter  I.  Birth.  Motherless  babyhood.  Proud  recollections  of  a  faith- 
ful father.  Physical  and  mental  development.  Wirt's  Patrick  Henry. 
Bible-reading  in  boyhood.  The  Multum-in-parvo  "Red-book."  The 
reading-room  at  the  meeting-house.  Story  of  John  Doakum.  Story 
of  James  Beauchamp  concentered  into  "Champ."  Col.  Bennett  Clark 
at  "Beauchamp,"  in  France.  Motherly  Mrs.  Call.  Cranky,  super- 
stitious John  Call.  Colonel  Watterson's  valuable  hints.  First  whole 
dollar;  boyish  use  of  it.  Last  farm  work,  in  Kentucky.  Amusements 
of  long  ago:  hunting,  fishing,  hog-killing,  apple-bobbing,  spelling-bees, 
"playing  'possum."  Cold-blooded  murder  of  "  Ranger."  First  knowl- 
edge of  a  President  of  the  United  States I 

Chapter  II.  Children  of  my  father  and  mother.  Marriage.  Children. 
Early  housekeeping.  Twelve  thousand  people  attend  Genevieve's 
wedding.  Bennett  learns  to  ride  on  a  Jersey  cow.  Value  of  ponies 
to  children.  Birth  of  my  grandson  celebrated  by  the  House.  It  makes 
him  a  fine  present.  Kindness  of  Mr.  Mann,  the  Republican  leader. 
Tom  Bodine's  tender  article.    The  dear  little  boy's  death.   .     .     .32 

Chapter  III.  My  first  school-teachers.  Brady  and  Whittern.  Morgan 
and  Woolford.  Kentucky  soldiers  and  gentlemen.  Generals  Morgan, 
Beattie,  and  Breckenridge,  as  horsemen.  "Two-story-and-a-half 
head."  Coulter  and  Prather  fatal  feud.  Cowardly  murder  of  old  man 
Coulter.  Whittern's  sui  generis  arithmetic  class.  Wonderful  war 
heroes.  Saw  and  heard  piano  first  on  Election  Day.  First  law-book. 
Clerking  in  store  when  only  fourteen  years  old.  Debating  societies. 
Mule-races.    Love  of  my  pupils.    Colonel  Glenn 44 

Chapter  IV.  First  really  great  man  I  ever  saw.  Played  "hooky'*  to  hear 
political  speeches.  Governor  Bramlett's  pince-nez  spectacles.  My 
"  first  appearance  on  the  stage."  Chaplain  shouted,  "  Boys,  give  them 
hell.'*  Civil  War  and  reign  of  terror.  I  heard  battle  of  Perryville  and 
saw  battle  of  Mackville.  General  Duke's  thrilling  escape.  Two  great 
steers,  "  Buck"  and  "  Darby.'*  Little  girl  witnessed  murder  of  grand- 
mother.   Triple  lynching  followed 63 

Chapter  V.  Kansas.  Grasshoppers.  I  locate  in  Missouri.  Teach  schooL 
Edit  a  paper.  Practise  law.  Prosecuting  attorney.  Lawsuits.  Office- 
holding.  Transylvania.  Shooting-scrape.  Attend  theater  to  hear 
"Faust."    Teach  singing  in  public  school.    Raise  Sunday-school  class. 


417757 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Pleasant  recollections  of  letting  off  young  first  offenders  with  fines  or 
jail  sentences.  Unwittingly  carry  a  challenge.  Preside  at  religious 
debate.     Two  humble  and  noble  servants  of  God 93 

Chapter  VI.     William  P.  Taylor,  legislator,  hanged.     I  was  nominated 

for  the  Legislature  first  by  a  grand  jury 156 

Chapter  VII.  The  Norton  and  Robinson  feud.  Colonel  Hutton  got  to 
Congress  by  Norton's  and  Robinson's  delegates.  The  "flip-a-dollar" 
nomination  of  Norton.  Then  came  the  Clark-and-Norton  campaign 
of  six  months' incessant  struggling,  and  Clark's  nomination.     .      .     .  163 

Chapter  VIII.    The  Congress 188 

Chapter   IX.     Cleveland's   second    inauguration.     Gresham.     Carlisle. 

Lamont.     Bissell.    Olney.     Vice-President  Stevenson 229 

Chapter  X.     Re?d  and  Crisp 269 

Chapter  XI.    The  Speakership 296 

Chapter  XII.  Campaign  of  1892.  Tom  Johnson  and  Larry  Neal.  Fight 
over  tariff  plank  in  convention.  Crisp  re-elected  Speaker.  Silver  de- 
bate. My  tariff  speech.  Income  tax.  Wilson  chairman  of  Ways  and 
Means.     Gorman's  prophecy.    A  question  of  veracity 317 

Chapter  XIII.     Gorman,  Cleveland,  Vest,  Harris,  Jones,  Wilson,  Hill, 

Breckenridge,    and  others.     Free    documents.     Pensions.        .      .      .  344 

Chapter  XIV.     The  Fifty-fourth  a  Do-nothing  Congress.     Henderson. 

Polling  the  House.    Tammany  speech.    Doctor  English.    Underwood.  370 

Chapter  XV.  Fifty-fifth  Congress.  Spanish  War.  Dingley  bill.  Ohio 
feuds  in  general.  The  Sherman-McKinley-Hanna  feud  in  particular. 
Sherman  and  Alger 400 

Chapter  XVI.    McKinley  and  Roosevelt 424 

Chapter  XVII.     Colonel  Roosevelt 450 

Chapter  XVIII.     Hay  and  Roosevelt 464 

Chapter  XIX.    The  gold  plank  adopted  by  Republicans  in  1896.      ,     .  474 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

Champ  Clark  as   he   appears  today Frontispiece 

John  Hampton  Clark,  father  of  Champ  Clark      .  Facing  p.  30 
Champ  Clark  at  eleven  years  of  age     ....  **       30 
Two  views  of  Champ  Clark*s  birthplace  in  Ken- 
tucky      . **     116 

Home  of  Champ  Clark  at  Bowling  Green,  Mis- 
souri         **     164 

Champ  Clark  at  the  age  of  twenty-nine    .     .     .  **     216 

Mrs.  Champ  Clark **     384 


MY    QUARTER    CENTURY 
OF   AMERICAN    POLITICS 


MY    QUARTER    CENTURY 
OF   AMERICAN    POLITICS 


CHAPTER  I 

Birth — Motherless  babyhood— Proud  recollections  of  a  faithful  father — 
Phjrsical  and  mental  development — ^Wirt's  Patrick  Henry — Bible-reading 
in  boyhood — The  Multunfin-farvo  "Red-book" — The  reading-room  at 
the  meeting-house — Story  of  John  Doakum — Story  of  James  Beauchamp 
concentered  into  "Champ" — Col.  Bennett  Clark  at  "Beauchamp,"  in 
France — Motherly  Mrs.  Call — Cranky,  superstitious  John  Call — Colonel 
Watterson's  valuable  hints — First  whole  dollar;  boyish  use  of  it — Last 
farm  work,  in  Kentucky — Amusements  of  long  ago:  hunting,  fishing, 
hog-killing,  apple-bobbing,  spelling-bees,  "playing  'possum" — Cold- 
blooded murder  of  "Ranger" — First  knowledge  of  a  President  of  the 
United  States. 


WHEN  Abraham  Lincoln  first  began  to  loom  up  as 
a  presidential  candidate  a  newspaper  man  asked 
him  for  a  history  of  himself  and  his  ancestors.     He  replied : 

"It  may  all  be  compressed  into  Gray's  line,  *The  short 
and  simple  annals  of  the  poor/" 

According  to  my  way  of  thinking,  the  story  of  my  life 
differs  little  from  that  of  thousands  of  others,  born,  bred, 
and  living  under  similar  circumstances.  I  once  said,  "It 
could  all  be  condensed  into  these  words :  Fifty-odd  years 
of  unremitting  toil.'' 

At  a  great  dinner  given  in  his  honor  a  lady  asked  the 
Duke  of  Wellington  to  describe,  for  her  edification,  the 
battle  of  Waterloo.    The  grim  old  soldier  answered: 

Vol.  I.—l 


2  MY   QUARTER   CENTURY   OF 

^'VJt  pounded  the  French;  they  pounded  us;  we  out- 
pounded  them!^' 

That  is  the  shortest,  tersest,  and  most  graphic  de- 
scription of  that  epochal  struggle  in  all  literature. 

I  started  out  to  accomphsh  certain  things.  I  kept 
pounding  away  at  them  and  have  achieved  most  of  them. 
As  a  rule,  I  outpounded  my  opponents.  Sometimes  I 
didn't — particularly  on  one  most  notable  occasion. 

Endowed  by  nature  with  a  strong  constitution,  I  have 
been  able  to  do  more  work  than  most  men.  Labor  is 
the  basis  of  all  success — labor  of  brawn  or  brain.  My 
long  public  career  is  due  largely  to  the  fact  that  I  have 
been  blessed  with  as  faithful  a  constituency  as  man 
ever  had. 

In  191 1,  at  a  great  home-coming  picnic,  attended  by 
some  ten  or  fifteen  thousand  people,  given  in  my  honor, 
I  stated  that  I  believed  my  constituents  are  more  am- 
bitious for  me  than  I  am  for  myself;  and  I  stated  the 
exact  truth;  but  as  my  wife,  children,  and  many  friends 
want  to  know  some  of  the  facts,  experiences,  and  recollec- 
tions of  my  busy  life,  I  will  give  them  as  briefly,  modestly, 
and  as  accurately  as  possible — ^writing  about  the  persons, 
books,  circumstances,  and  things  which  most  influenced 
my  life. 

I  was  born  on  a  farm  near  Lawrenceburg,  Kentucky,  on 
the  seventh  day  of  March,  1850.  That  was  the  day  on 
which  Daniel  Webster  made  what  is  called  his  "Seventh 
of  March  Speech"  in  support  of  the  compromises  of  the 
Constitution,  with  special  reference  to  the  Fugitive  Slave 
law.  That  speech  practically  ended  his  political  career. 
From  being  a  popular  idol  in  New  England,  his  name 
became  anathema,  and  his  picture  was  turned  to  the 
wall  in  hundreds  of  thousands  of  homes.  Perhaps  no 
man  was  ever  more  savagely  abused  on  the  stump,  the 
lecture-platform,  in  pulpit  and  magazines,  in  newspapers 
and  in  private  conversation  than  was  Daniel  Webster 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  3 

for   making   that   speech.     To   them   he   ceased   to   be 
"Daniel  the  Godlike";  instead,  he  became  **Ichabod." 

The  Quaker  poet,  John  Greenleaf  Whittier,  wrote  the 
following  poem,  entitled  "Ichabod,"  about  Webster,  which 
may  be  regarded  as  one  of  the  most  terrific  personal  poems 
ever  written  in  our  vernacular: 

So  fallen!  so  lost!  the  light  withdrawn 

Which  once  he  wore! 
The  glory  from  his  gray  hairs  gone 

Forevermore! 

Revile  him  not — the  Tempter  hath 

A  snare  for  all; 
And  pitying  tears,  not  scorn  and  wrath. 

Befit  his  fall! 

Oh,  dumb  be  passion's  stormy  rage. 

When  he  who  might 
Have  lighted  up  and  led  his  age 

Falls  back  in  night. 

Scorn!  would  the  angels  laugh,  to  mark 

A  bright  soul  driven, 
Fiend-goaded,  down  the  endless  dark 

From  hope  and  heaven? 

Let  not  the  land  once  proud  of  him 

Insult  him  now. 
Nor  brand  with  deeper  shame  his  dim 

Dishonored  brow. 

But  let  its  humbled  sons,  instead. 

From  sea  to  lake, 
A  long  lament,  as  for  the  dead. 

In  sadness  make. 

Of  all  we  loved  and  honored,  naught 

Save  power  remains — 
A  fallen  angers  pride  of  thought, 

Still  strong  in  chains. 


4         MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

All  else  is  gone;  from  those  great  eyes 

The  soul  has  fled; 
When  faith  is  lost,  when  honor  dies. 

The  man  is  dead! 

Then,  pay  the  reverence  of  old  days 

To  his  dead  fame; 
Walk  backward,  with  averted  gaze, 

And  hide  the  shame! 

My  mother*s  maiden  name  was  Aletha  Jane  Beau- 
champ,  and  she  was  a  native  of  Kentucky.  Her  ances- 
tors, the  Beauchamps,  Jetts,  and  Robertsons,  were  origi- 
nally Virginians  and  were  among  the  earliest  pioneers  in 
Kentucky.  Her  father,  James  T.  Beauchamp,  was,  when 
quite  a  young  man,  a  member  of  the  Kentucky  Legis- 
lature.    Both  he  and  his  wife  died  before  middle  life. 

George  Robertson,  so  long  a  Representative  in  Congress 
and  Chief  Justice  of  the  Kentucky  Court  of  Appeals,  was 
my  mother's  third  cousin.  She  was  also  distantly  related 
to  Gov.  Bob  Letcher. 

She  died  when  I  was  three  years  old,  and  I  cannot  re- 
member her,  but  I  have  a  hazy  recollection  of  attending  her 
burial.  A  very  old  kinswoman  told  me  a  few  years  ago 
that  I  had  to  be  dragged  away  from  my  mother's  grave. 
She  never  had  a  picture  taken,  therefore  I  do  not  know 
how  she  looked;  but  the  testimony  of  all  of  her  ac- 
quaintances is  that  she  was  a  sweet,  lovely,  beautiful, 
graceful,  gracious  woman,  small  in  body,  with  black 
hair,  dark-blue  eyes,  and  delicate  complexion.  The  tra- 
dition is  that  she  was  a  prime  favorite  with  all  who  knew 
her — instant  in  every  good  work. 

My  father  was  John  Hampton  Clark,  named  for  his 
half-brother  lost  at  sea.  He  was  born  in  New  Jersey  at 
"Clark's  Landing,"  close  to  what  is  now  Atlantic  City. 
His  mother  was  a  Quakeress,  Elizabeth  Archer,  who  was 
a  native  of  New  Jersey.     His  great-great-grandfather. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  5 

great-grandfather,  grandfather,  and  father  were  all  born 
and  reared  in  Connecticut,  the  first  of  his  ancestors 
settHng  there  in  1654. 

Notwithstanding  these  facts,  in  191 2,  when  I  was  the 
leading  candidate  for  the  Democratic  presidential  nomina- 
tion, a  Bost9n  editor,  bent  on  saying  something  mean 
about  me  and  unable  to  find  any  truth  that  would  injure 
me,  originated  a  contemptible  falsehood  to  the  effect  that 
I  left  Kentucky  for  Missouri  to  **get  rid  of  the  Yankees." 
He  did  not  possess  intelligence  enough  to  know  that  there 
are  at  least  a  hundred  Yankees  in  Missouri  to  one  in  Ken- 
tucky. How  much  pay  he  received  for  that  stupid  canard 
I  do  not  know,  but  it  is  an  abiding  pleasure  to  remember 
that  I  carried  Massachusetts  by  a  large  majority  over 
President  Wilson,  in  spite  of  that  editor's  malice  and 
mendacity. 

My  father  was  originally  a  carriage-  and  buggy-maker. 
His  health  failing,  he  opened  a  singing-school.  Older 
rural  folks  pleasantly  remember  the  old-fashioned 
singing-school  masters  with  inevitable  tuning-fork. 
He  afterward  practised  dentistry.  He  was  a  good  car- 
riage- and  buggy-maker,  a  good  singing-master,  a  good 
dentist,  a  good  Democrat,  a  good  Christian,  a  good  citi- 
zen. He  was  not  an  educated  man  in  the  technical  sense, 
but  he  was  a  man  with  splendid  intellect  and  was  an 
omnivorous  reader.  He  possessed  a  vast  store  of  infor- 
mation. When  in  his  prime  he  was  about  six  feet  tall, 
never  weighed  over  one  hundred  and  sixty-five  pounds, 
was  delicate  all  his  life.  He  had  a  twenty-four-inch  head 
— one  of  the  finest  I  ever  saw — most  of  it  above  and  in 
front  of  his  ears.  The  intellectual  part  of  his  head  was 
remarkably  well  developed.  The  back  part  of  his  head, 
which  contains  the  driving  apparatus,  was  not  well 
developed. 

He  was  a  handsome  man.  He  had  very  dark-brown 
hair  which  most  people  would  have  called  black.     He 


6         MY   QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

had  one  brown  eye  and  one  blue  one.  He  had  a  very 
heavy,  fine,  luxuriant  beard.  While  not  a  public  speaker, 
he  was  the  best  reader,  conversationalist,  and  anecdote- 
teller  that  I  ever  knew.  The  delight  of  his  life  was  to 
argue  in  favor  of  the  principles  in  which  he  believed, 
rehgious  or  poHtical.  He  was  a  splendid  horseman  and, 
poor  as  he  was,  always  managed  to  have  one  of  the  best 
saddlers  in  the  country,  which  he  treated  with  the  tender- 
ness with  which  he  would  treat  a  child.  The  most  famous 
of  these  was  a  Morgan  mare,  a  bay  roan,  blazed-faced  and 
dish-faced — one  of  the  most  vicious  animals  I  ever  knew, 
but  tough  as  whitleather.  In  proper  hands  she  would 
have  made  a  great  racing-animal.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
I  used  to  steal  her  out  on  the  sly,  and  run  races  with  all 
the  boys  in  the  neighborhood,  taking  the  risk  of  getting 
soundly  thrashed  by  my  father  for  so  doing — but  winning 
all  the  races.  It  was  rare  fun.  Verily  horse-racing  is  the 
sport  of  kings  and  of  some  others. 

When  I  first  remember,  he  rode  around  after  the  fashion 
of  a  Methodist  circuit-rider,  over  six  or  eight  small  coun- 
ties in  Kentucky,  with  a  large  pair  of  saddle-bags  which 
held  about  a  half-bushel  in  each  end.  One  was  filled  with 
his  implements  of  dental  torture  and  the  other  with  the 
speeches  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  John  C.  Breckenridge, 
and  other  Democratic  worthies,  together  with  a  change 
of  Hnen.  It  was  the  dehght  of  his  life  to  corner  up  Whigs 
and  argue  with  them  until  they  were  dizzy.  He  never 
had  any  faculty  for  making  money,  and  I  do  not  believe 
he  cared  anything  about  it.  I  am  reasonably  certain  that 
he  never  owned  five  hundred  dollars*  worth  of  property 
at  one  time  in  his  life. 

He  set  his  heart  on  two  things:  that  his  children  should 
be  well  developed,  mentally  and  physically,  and  that  they 
should  have  good  educations.  He  lived  to  see  these 
desires  of  his  heart  gratified,  for  he  lived  to  reach  the  good 
old  age  of  eighty-six,  and  would  undoubtedly  have  lived 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  7 

to  be  a  hundred  if  his  legs  had  not  given  way,  which 
caused  him  to  fall  and  hurt  his  back,  thereby  paralyzing 
him. 

If  I  have  achieved  anything  worth  mentioning  in  this 
Hfe,  I  owe  the  most  of  it  to  him,  for  he  was  constantly 
dinning  into  my  ears:  "Get  an  education;  take  care 
of  your  health;  develop  your  physical  and  mental 
constitution." 

To  increase  my  bodily  strength  he  set  me  to  chinning 
poles,  swinging  on  hand-swings,  and  other  exercises  of 
similar  character. 

He  knew  more  about  the  political  history  of  the 
United  States  than  any  other  man  with  whom  I  have 
ever  come  into  contact,  and  he  knew  more  about  the 
Bible  than  any  other  layman  I  ever  saw — as  much  as 
most  of  the  preachers  and  more  than  many  of  them. 

He  had  a  fine  sense  of  humor,  his  honesty  was  above 
question,  his  honor  perfect,  and  he  was  unafraid. 

He  was  an  amateur  politician,  never  wanted  an  office, 
never  was  a  candidate,  but  he  was  always  in  the  fray  for 
his  friends;  and  so  far  as  his  enemies  were  concerned  he 
"laid  on  and  spared  not,  smiting  them  hip  and  thigh." 

He  frequently  advised  me  never  to  be  a  candidate  for 
office;  but,  as  he  was  forever  talking  about  his  favorites 
in  public  Hfe,  his  delightful  conversation  outweighed  hid 
advice  in  that  regard,  which  I  did  not  take  to  heart. 

The  truth  is  that  one  book  which  he  borrowed  for  me 
to  read  largely  determined  the  course  of  my  life.  He 
bought  for  his  children  all  the  books  his  small  means 
permitted,  and  borrowed  all  he  could  in  his  peregrinations 
on  his  dental  circuit.  Once  upon  a  time,  when  I  was 
about  ten  years  old,  he  brought  me  William  Wirt's  Life 
of  Patrick  Henry — as  wild  a  romance  as  was  ever  put 
between  covers,  and  exceedingly  interesting.  That  book 
made  it  appear  that  winning  lawsuits  and  going  to  Con- 
gress were  as  easy  as  falling  off  a  log,  and  a  sHppery  log 


8        MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

at  that.  I  have  not  found  it  so;  but  that  book  deter- 
mined me  to  be  a  lawyer  and  a  Congressman  before  I  had 
ever  seen  a  lawyer,  a  law-book,  a  court-house,  or  a  Con- 
gressman. Very  small  things  frequently  shape  human 
careers. 

A  pebble  in  the  streamlet  scant 

Has  turned  the  course  of  many  a  river; 

A  dewdrop  on  the  baby  plant 

Has  dwarfed  the  giant  oak  forever. 

That  life  of  the  forest-born  Demosthenes  had  another 
important  effect  upon  me.  When  I  was  a  small  boy  I 
would  not  read  the  Bible.  There  were  no  Sunday-schools 
in  the  neighborhood  and  nobody  to  show  me  the  beautiful 
stories  and  splendid  literature  of  the  Bible.  One  day 
after  I  had  read  Patrick  Henry's  Lijcy  my  father  said, 
"How  did  you  hke  Wirt's  book?" 

"First  rate,"  I  replied. 

"What  part  did  you  Hke  best?"  he  inquired. 

I  answered:  "His  speech  beginning,  *It  is  natural  for 
man  to  indulge  in  the  illusions  of  hope.' " 

"What,"  continued  he,  "is  the  best  sentence  In  that 
speech  ?" 

"*The  race  is  not  always  to  the  swift  nor  the  battle 
to  the  strong,'"  was  my  reply. 

He  said:  "My  son,  Patrick  Henry  never  originated 
that.  King  Solomon  wrote  it  and  if  you  will  read  the 
Bible  you  will  find  many  more  just  as  fine." 

I  began  reading  the  Bible  to  see  if  his  statement  was 
correct  and  have  continued  to  read  it  ever  since.  When 
I  contract  brain  fag,  I  read  King  Solomon's  Proverbs 
and  St.  Paul's  epistles  as  mental  tonics.  Of  all  the  com- 
pliments ever  paid  me  by  the  newspapers  since  I  have 
been  in  Congress,  the  one  I  value  most  is  to  the  effect 
that  I  quote  the  Bible  more  frequently  and  more  accu- 
rately than   any  other  public   man   in  a   quarter  of  a 


,  AMERICAN    POLITICS  9 

century.  Whether  true  or  not  1  will  not  undertake 
to  say. 

Before  my  father  borrowed  for  me  The  Life  of  Patrick 
Henry,  he  bought  for  me,  as  a  Christmas  present,  a 
very  small  book  bound  in  red  cloth,  containing  The  Arti- 
cles of  Confederation,  The  Declaration  of  Independence, 
The  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  Washington's 
Farewell  Address,  and — nothing  more. 

In  giving  it  to  me  my  father  said:  **My  boy,  you  will 
not  read  the  Bible  and  I  want  you  to  read  this  book. 
Next  to  the  Bible  it  is  the  best  one  I  know  of." 

I  did  read  it  until  I  knew  the  Declaration  and  most  of 
the  other  three  great  documents  by  heart.  I  did  it  this 
way.  I  was  compelled  to  attend  religious  services  on 
Sundays  at  Glen's  Creek  Church.  It  was  a  large,  hewed- 
log  house,  with  a  white-oak  post  in  the  center,  about  two 
feet  square,  to  hold  the  roof  up.  I  would  cuddle  down 
behind  the  post,  and  when  the  long  sermon  was  too  dry 
to  interest  my  youthful  mind,  or  too  full  of  theological 
technicalities  for  me  to  assimilate,  I  would  get  my  big 
little  book  out  of  my  pocket  and  go  to  work  to  commit 
its  precious  contents  to  memory. 

It  was  a  fine  mental  exercise  and  laid  a  broad  founda- 
tion for  understanding  the  genius  of  our  free  institutions, 
though  it  did  nothing  to  promote  my  religious  training. 

If  I  had  my  way,  every  boy  and  girl  in  America  would 
commit  to  memory  The  Declaration  of  Independence, 
not  only  for  its  political  truths,  but  also  for  its  Hterary 
excellence.  A  man  of  sensibility  cannot  read  it,  even 
now,  without  having  his  blood  flow  faster.  I  believe  that 
the  majestic  sweep  of  the  Declaration  helped  us  to  gain 
our  liberty. 

I  believe  that  those  three  books,  the  Bible,  Wirt's 
Life  of  Patrick  Henry,  and  my  little  red  book,  did  more 
to  influence  my  life  than  all  other  books  that  I  have 
read  put  together. 


lo       MY    QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

Attendance  at  that  old  Glen's  Creek  Meeting-house — 
for  in  that  far-away  day  that  is  what  country  folk  called 
a  church  building — had  an  influence  on  me  in  practising 
law. 

On  a  front  seat  Sunday  after  Sunday  sat  a  somewhat 
aged  person  with  a  head  as  bald  as  a  billiard  ball.  Three 
things  fixed  my  boyish  attention  upon  him:  his  shining 
poll;  the  fact  that  he  shed  tears  copiously  during  every 
sermon;  and  the  further  fact  that  he  always  put  a  silver 
dollar  in  the  hat  when  passed  around — a  Hberal  contribu- 
tion m  that  day  and  place.  What  puzzled  me  most  was 
his  habitual  weeping. 

One  Sunday,  going  home  through  the  woods  from 
church,  I  asked  my  father  what  old  man  John  Doakum 
— for  that  was  his  name — ^was  always  crying  so  much 
about.  He  said:  "I  do  not  know  what  the  old  wretch 
is  crying  about,  but  I  know  what  he  ought  to  be  crying 
about — how  he  killed  his  own  son!"  Then  he  gave  me 
a  blood-curdling  account  of  that  revolting  crime — one 
of  the  most  beastly  I  have  ever  read  or  heard  of. 

It  is  said  that  early  impressions  are  never  eff^aced,  and 
most  assuredly  it  was  true  in  this  case.  The  horrible 
story  related  to  me  by  my  father,  of  that  bloody  butchery, 
made  such  a  profound  impression  upon  me  and  has  so 
rested  on  me  all  my  life,  that,  during  my  long  and  active 
practice  at  the  bar,  nothing  would  have  induced  me  to 
defend  a  man  who  had  killed  his  own  son.  The  thick 
beech  woods  through  which  we  were  walking,  my  father's 
vibrant  voice  and  his  flashing  eyes,  are  as  clear  to  my 
mental  vision  to-day  as  they  were  to  my  physical  vision 
fifty-odd  years  ago. 

Old  Doakum  killed  his  son  at  the  beginning  of  the  Civil 
War.  The  times  were  sadly  out  of  joint,  everything  was 
topsy-turvy,  and  in  some  way,  through  some  sinister 
influence,  he  went  unwhipped  of  justice,  though  he  richly 
deserved  to  stretch  hemp.     He  was  a  prominent  citizen. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  ii 

a  big  farmer,  and  what  Senator  Thomas  Hart  Benton 
would  have  characterized  as  "a  jacklcg  lawyer."  He 
claimed  to  be  a  strong  Union  man  and  had  the  unspeak- 
able impudence  to  run  for  county  attorney. 

In  1863  I  heard  him  and  others  speak  at  the  first  bar- 
becue I  ever  attended.  Among  other  things,  he  said: 
"You  men  ought  to  vote  for  me  because  the  only  son  I 
have  is  in  the  Army  of  the  Cumberland  fighting  bravely 
in  defense  of  our  country  and  our  flag." 

A  half-drunken  young  fellow  leaning  against  a  dogwood 
saphng  right  in  front  of  the  speakers'  stand,  bawled  out 
in  stentorian  voice:  **You  infernal  old  scoundrel,  you 
would  have  had  another  son  if  you  hadn't  killed  him!" 
whereupon  the  crowd  set  up  a  mighty  yell,  and  old 
Doakum's  poHtical  goose  was  cooked  brown.  I  was 
delighted,  and  did  a  good  deal  of  yelHng  myself  in  a  boy- 
ish treble.  It  is  pleasant  even  yet  to  remember  that 
outburst  of  righteous  indignation,  and  dehghtful  to  recol- 
lect that  old  Doakum  was  beaten  out  of  his  boots,  and 
that,  too,  by  the  biggest  fool  that  ever  held  that  office  in 
any  county  in  Kentucky,  or  in  fact  in  all  America. 

My  parents  named  me  James  Beauchamp  Clark. 
Clark  is  the  seventh  most  widely  diffused  surname  in 
America.  It  is  a  corruption  of  the  old  Latin  word 
clericusy  which  means  a  "scholar." 

In  the  early  days  of  our  history  "Clerk"  was  often 
pronounced  "Clark,"  and  in  the  extreme  backwoods 
occasionally  a  very  old  person  is  found  who  pronounces 
it  that  way  to  this  day,  as  is  the  habit  in  England. 

Years  ago  I  read  a  story  to  this  effect:  "When  they 
were  young  lawyers,  and  IlHnois  was  in  the  raw,  Abraham 
Lincoln,  who  was  six  feet  four,  and  his  lifelong  friend 
and  competitor,  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  who  was  about  five 
feet  tall,  got  lost  on  the  open  prairie,  and,  night  coming 
on,  they  applied  for  lodgings  at  a  cabin.  At  bedtime  the 
landlady,    judging   their    relative    importance    by   their 


12       MY    QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

statures,  told  Lincoln  that  he  could  sleep  in  the  loft,  and 
his  little  *clark,'  as  she  designated  Douglas,  could  sleep 
in  the  trundle-bed  with  the  children." 

That  cabin,  if  it  still  is  in  existence,  should  be  treasured 
as  a  historic  relic.  Parenthetically,  it  may  be  truthfully 
stated  that  an  open  prairie  is  the  easiest  place  on  the 
earth  to  get  lost  in. 

Strange  to  relate,  Hon.  David  Lubin,  the  enthusiastic 
agricultural  economist,  came  into  my  office  a  few  days 
after  the  foregoing  was  written,  and  I  was  surprised  to 
observe  that  invariably  he  pronounced  "clerk"  as 
"dark." 

J.  B.  is  one  of  the  most  common  combinations  in 
Christian  names — John  B.,  James  B.,  Julian  B.,  Joseph 
B.,  and  so  forth.  On  the  average  there  is  perhaps  one 
J.  B.  Clark  at  every  post-office  in  America.  As  long  as 
I  was  a  boy  that  fact  did  not  bother  me,  but  when  I 
became  old  enough  to  receive  letters  I  was  always  getting 
mixed  up  with  somebody  else.  Finally  when  I  was 
twenty-four  years  old  I  went  to  visit  my  uncle,  a  lawyer 
at  Bowling  Green,  Kentucky.  I  ordered  my  mail  for- 
warded to  me  there.  There  was  a  man  by  the  name  of 
James  B.  Clark  living  in  that  city.  He  was  unusually 
dense.  He  not  only  opened  my  letters,  which  was  excus- 
able, but  he  sent  them  all  back  to  the  places  from  which 
they  came,  which  was  not  only  inexcusable,  but  annoy- 
ing; so  I  made  up  my  mind  that  I  would  not  keep  a 
name  which  was  owned  by  so  many  other  people.  I 
first  lopped  off  the  "James,"  but  that  left  me  with  a 
name  which  nobody  but  a  Frenchman  could  pronounce 
correctly,  and  Americans  pronounced  it  in  a  half-dozen 
different  ways,  all  wrong.  I  would  have  liked  very  much 
to  retain  it,  as  it  was  my  mother's  name.  It  means  "fair 
field"  and  is  a  beautiful  name,  but  it  could  not  be  pro- 
nounced in  this  country  correctly.  By  the  way,  Camp- 
bell is  the  same  name  as  Beauchamp.     Camp  and  Champ 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  13 

mean  the  same  thing,  being  the  old  Latin  word  campus, 
and  belle  is  the  feminine  of  beau.  I  cut  Reauchamp  in 
two  in  the  middle  and  retained  the  last  half.  Governor 
Hoadly  of  Ohio,  one  of  my  old  law  professors,  used  to 
say  that  a  man  had  as  much  right  to  cut  off  part  of  his 
Christian  name  as  to  trim  off  part  of  his  hair.  I  state 
this  minor  event  correctly,  because  it  has  been  stated  so 
often  incorrectly. 

One  sequel  to  that  transaction  was  that  the  first  lect- 
ure I  ever  delivered,  and  of  which  I  have  the  manuscript 
yet,  was  on  "The  Philosophy  of  Names."  It  is  a  fertile 
and  an  interesting  theme. 

Various  men  have  left  off  part  of  their  Christian  names. 
Charles  Dickens  was  christened  with  half  a  dozen;  White- 
law  Reid  was  named  Jacob  Whitelaw;  President  Cleve- 
land's name,  as  bestowed  by  his  parents,  was  Stephen 
Grover;  President  Wilson  was  Thomas  Woodrow. 

My  son,  whom  we  named  Bennett  Clark  for  his  mother, 
as  soon  as  he  became  old  enough  to  observe  things, 
inserted  the  Champ  into  his  name,  and  he  is  now  Bennett 
Champ. 

I  have  always  entertained  the  theory  that  the  oldest 
boy  in  a  family  ought  to  be  given  his  mother's  maiden 
family  name — if  at  all  suitable — as  part  compensation  to 
her  for  losing  her  name  by  marriage. 

My  surgical  operation  on  my  name  had  one  unexpected 
and  beneficial  effect.  It  caused  my  name.  Champ  Clark, 
to  be  printed  in  full  in  the  newspapers,  whereas  other 
Representatives  were  generally  referred  to  only  by  their 
surnames.  That  grew  out  of  two  facts.  One  was  that 
I  was  the  only  Clark  in  America  who  bears  the  Christian 
name  of  Champ,  and  the  other  was  that  my  Christian 
name  and  surname,  taken  together,  contain  only  ten 
letters. 

Shakespeare  hath  it:  "A  rose  by  any  other  name  would 
smell  as  sweet,"  which  is  Hterally  true;  but,  nevertheless 


14       MY   QUARTER   CENTURY   OF 

and  notwithstanding,  some  names  are  more  useful  and 
fitting  than  others. 

While  my  son,  Col.  Bennett  C.  Clark,  was  on  a  long 
march  in  France  at  the  head  of  his  regiment,  the  140th 
Infantry,  they  camped  one  night  near  a  small  village  into 
which  he  rode,  to  learn  the  name  of  the  place  and  to  do 
some  shopping.  He  wrote  me  that  he  was  greatly  sur- 
prised to  discover  that  the  name  of  the  town  was  Beau- 
champ — evidently  founded  by  and  named  for  our  maternal 
ancestors — and  that  it  gave  him  a  queer  feeling  to  ride 
into  it  in  command  of  an  American  regiment  eight  hun- 
dred years  after  our  kinsmen  crossed  the  Channel  into 
England — or  more  than  four  centuries  before  Columbus 
discovered  the  Western  World. 

Because  I  had  a  large  head  and  a  small  neck  my  father 
was  afraid  that  I  was  going  to  have  a  feeble  constitution. 
So,  when  I  was  eight  years  old  he  hired  me  out  to  work 
on  a  farm — perhaps  the  best  thing  that  ever  happened  to 
me.  It  kept  me  out-of-doors,  developed  my  body,  taught 
me  habits  of  industry,  and  made  me  love  agriculture,  which 
I  do  to  this  day.  If  I  were  rich  enough  to  do  it,  I  would 
rather  live  on  a  good  farm  than  anywhere  else  on  earth. 

When  the  Civil  War  began  I  was  working  for  a  man 
named  John  Call,  near  Mackville,  Washington  County, 
Kentucky.  He  was  one  of  the  best  farmers  that  I  ever 
knew,  and  his  wife  was  one  of  the  kindest  women  in  the 
world.  She  treated  my  sister  and  myself  just  as  well  as 
she  treated  her  own  children. 

Call  lived  sixty  miles  from  Louisville.  On  account  of 
bad  health,  especially  weak  eyes,  he  could  not  read  fine 
print,  so  he  made  me  the  proposition  that  he  would  take 
George  D.  Prentice's  Louisville  Daily  Journal  if  I  would 
read  it  to  him  at  night.  He  was  not  trying  to  do  me  a 
kindness,  as  he  wanted  the  paper  read  for  his  own  infor- 
mation, but,  in  having  me  read  him  the  paper,  he  con- 
ferred on  me  a  great  benefit. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  15 

I  doubt  very  much  if  he  could  have  devised  a  better 
scheme  by  which  I  could  learn  good  EngHsh,  for  George 
D.  Prentice  was  one  of  the  greatest  masters  of  English 
prose  that  this  country  has  ever  known.  He  was  also 
a  poet  of  high  rank.  I  have  always  believed,  and  do  now 
believe,  that  if,  instead  of  spending  his  time  as  the  editor 
of  a  daily  newspaper,  he  had  devoted  himself  to  writing 
books,  he  would  have  stood  at  the  very  head  of  the 
literary  characters  of  America.  I  believe  that  he  was 
fully  as  great  an  editor  as  Horace  Greeley,  although 
the  palm  is  generally  conceded  to  Greeley.  I  read  The 
Daily  Journal  to  Call  for  more  than  three  years.  I 
greatly  profited  thereby.  The  old  Journal  was  after- 
ward merged  with  the  Democrat  and  Courier^  the  three 
papers  becoming  The  Courier- Journal,  now  owned  and 
conducted  by  Judge  Bingham,  and  for  many  years  edited 
by  Col.  Henry  Watterson. 

Colonel  Watterson  taught  me  a  valuable  lesson  in 
speech-making.  As  a  very  young  man,  without  any 
official  connection  with  the  St.  Louis  Tilden  convention, 
I  was  there  as  a  mere  "looker-on  in  Vienna."  A  kind- 
hearted,  big,  Irish  policeman  let  me  in  under  the  ropes, 
without  a  ticket,  and  I  am  glad  that  I  was  there,  for  I 
was  enabled  to  see  and  hear  a  remarkable  group  of  men, 
the  most  of  whom  have  now  gone  the  way  of  all  flesh. 

They  were  Gen.  John  A.  McClernand,  Col.  Henry 
Watterson,  Senator  Kernan,  "Sunset"  Cox,  John  Mor- 
rissey,  John  Kelly,  Senator  Doolittle,  Governor  Dors- 
heimer.  Gen.  Tom  Ewing,  Governor  Walker  of  Virginia, 
Dan  W.  Voorhees,  "Blue  Jeans"  Williams,  Wade  Hamp- 
ton, James  B.  McCreary  (then,  as  thirty-six  years  later. 
Governor  of  Kentucky),  and  scores  of  others  famous  in 
their  day,  and  some  of  them  still  famous. 

Colonel  Watterson  was  temporary  chairman,  and  Gen- 
eral McClernand,  the  permanent  chairman.  It  was  a 
most  distinguished  assembly. 


i6       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

One  of  the  most  spectacular  features  of  that  convention 
was  the  great  debate  betwixt  Gen.  Tom  Ewing  of  Ohio 
and  Governor  Dorsheimer  of  New  York,  on  the  financial 
plank  of  the  platform.     It  was  a  veritable  battle  of  giants. 

The  most  exciting  incident  of  that  great  conclave  was 
John  Kelly's  savage  excoriation  of  Samuel  J.  Tilden,  and 
it  was  one  of  the  most  remarkable  exhibitions  of  nerve 
and  courage  ever  witnessed  on  earth.  Catcalls  and  rattling 
of  spittoons  drowned  out  Kelly  for  half  an  hour.  Amid 
the  awful  storm  he  stood  like  an  iron  man;  then,  the 
crowd  having  worn  itself  out,  he  proceeded  with  his  job 
of  skinning  the  great  New-Yorker,  Next  morning,  Til- 
den having  been  nominated  the  night  before,  Kelly  gave 
in  his  adhesion  and  was  received  with  boundless  and  up- 
roarious applause  by  the  same  crowd  which  had  hooted 
him  so  outrageously  the  day  before. 

A  year  or  two  after  that  Colonel  Watterson  came  to 
Louisiana,  Pike  County,  Missouri,  where  I  then  lived,  to 
lecture.  I  introduced  him  to  the  audience,  and  after  the 
lecture  I  went  with  him  to  his  hotel  and  sat  up  to  wait 
with  him  for  his  midnight  train.  I  told  Colonel  Watter- 
son that  I  had  heard  and  greatly  admired  his  speech  as 
temporary  chairman,  to  which  he  replied: 

**  Young  man,  I  will  tell  you  something  that  very  few 
people  know  about  that  speech,  which  may  aid  you  in 
your  pubHc  career.  I  was  notified,  unexpectedly,  that  I 
was  to  be  the  temporary  chairman.  I  had  scarcely  time 
to  write  my  speech,  and  not  enough  to  commit  it  to 
memory.  I  did  not  want  to  read  it,  as  that  would  have 
killed  the  effect;  and,  moreover,  my  poor  eyesight  for- 
bade my  trying  to  read  it.  So  I  had  a  man  sit  behind 
me  on  the  stage  and  read  it  to  me,  sentence  by  sentence, 
as  I  deHvered  it.  The  reason  why  that  could  be  done  is 
that,  in  addressing  a  large  crowd,  you  must  pause  long 
enough  between  sentences  to  get  your  breath,  and  thus  the 
prompter  has  his  chance.'* 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  17 

I  studied  about  that,  and  practised  on  it,  until  I  for- 
mulated for  myself  a  rule,  as  follows:  If  I  write  a  speech 
to  be  delivered  to  a  large  audience,  I  allow  myself  twice 
as  much  time  for  its  delivery  as  it  would  take  to  read  it 
intelligibly  to  one  or  two  persons;  and,  if  the  audience 
is  to  be  a  very  large  one  and  out-of-doors,  I  allow  three 
times  as  much  time.     It  works  out  according  to  my  rule. 

In  fact,  in  speaking  to  an  unusually  large  audience,  the 
speaker  is  compelled  not  only  to  rest  between  sentences, 
but  to  enunciate  each  word  with  such  distinctness,  and 
so  slowly,  that  much  more  time  is  consumed  than  in  read- 
ing or  speaking  to  a  small  company. 

In  the  campaign  of  1880  I  had  an  amusing  and  fortu- 
nate experience  in  debate  with  an  able  Republican  friend 
who  did  not  understand  the  aforesaid  rule.  He  opened  in 
an  hour  and  closed  in  a  quarter  of  an  hour.  I  had  an 
hour  and  a  quarter  between  his  two  speeches.  He  began 
with  Jefferson  and  Hamilton  and  ambled  leisurely  down 
through  our  history,  and  had  just  reached  James  Buchan- 
an's administration  when  the  hammer  fell  at  the  end  of 
his  hour,  very  much  to  his  chagrin  and  to  the  dehght  of 
the  Democrats  and  the  discouragement  of  the  RepubHcans. 

The  first  money  I  ever  earned  was  a  silver  three-cent 
piece  which  my  father  gave  me  for  blacking  his  shoes. 
The  first  whole  dollar  I  ever  had  in  my  Hfe  I  made  in 
this  pecuHar  manner.  Four  of  us  were  binding  wheat 
after  an  old-fashioned  drop-reaper.  I  was  a  fast  hand 
at  that  sort  of  work.  Consequently,  I  had  some  leisure 
moments  every  time  the  reaper  went  round  the  field. 
The  wheat  had  much  rye  in  it  and  the  rye  had  a  great 
deal  of  ergot  on  it.  I  put  in  the  moments  which  I  could 
spare  from  the  wheat-binding  to  pulling  the  ergot  oflF  the 
rye  and  putting  it  into  the  big  pockets  of  my  tow-linen 
trousers.  I  finally  accumulated  a  pound  of  it,  whkh  I 
sold  to  the  village  doctor  for  a  dollar,  which  looked  to  me 
big  as  a  flapjack.     I  spent  it  for  a  multicolored  necktie 

Vol.  I.— 2 


i8       MY    QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

and  for  a  daguerreotype  picture  of  myself — the  first  ever 
made  of  me.  I  have  had  many  dollars,  neckties,  and  pict- 
ures of  myself  since  then,  but  none  that  I  so  highly  prized. 

The  last  work  that  ever  I  did  on  a  farm  in  Kentucky, 
I  bound  wheat  twelve  days  for  a  man  named  David  Best. 
I  received  twenty-four  dollars  for  that  labor,  which  I 
spent  going  to  school  to  a  man  named  Frank  Logsden. 

It  is  well  known  that  the  children  from  1850  to  i860 
had  neither  the  abundance  nor  quahty  nor  variety  of 
toys  which  children  have  now.  Nevertheless  and  not- 
withstanding, we  found  sources  of  amusement.  We  did 
not  have  firecrackers  of  any  sort,  either  small  or  giant, 
with  which  to  make  noises  at  Christmas,  but  we  devised 
noise-making  methods  of  our  own.  We  could  make  pop- 
guns of  alder  stalk  and  whistles  of  pawpaw  hmbs.  When 
hog-killing  time  came  (and  in  the  country  hog-killing  was 
a  great  and  enjoyable  social  function)  we  would  blow  up 
the  bladders,  tie  strings  around  the  necks  of  them,  and  put 
them  away  to  dry.  When  the  proper  time  came  we  would 
jump  on  them,  and  there  would  be  considerable  of  an 
explosion.     All  healthy  children  enjoy  making  a  noise. 

Hog-kiUing  was  a  time  of  joy  to  children.  We  would 
roast  the  tails  and  other  titbits  in  the  wood-fire  embers,  and 
eat  until  our  abdomens  assumed  aldermanic  proportions. 

We  had  no  beautiful  sleds  such  as  the  children  of  this 
day  have,  but  we  could  take  pieces  of  plank  and  make 
sleds  of  our  own,  which  answered  every  purpose  of  getting 
down  the  hill  swiftly — the  great  desideratum  in  sledding. 
We  wrestled,  ran  foot-races,  turned  handsprings,  played 
leap-frog,  jumped,  swam,  climbed  trees,  swung  in  grape- 
vine swings,  and  alas!  sometimes  we  fought.  The  word 
mollycoddle  was  not  in  the  bright  lexicon  of  Kentucky 
youth. 

We  caught  fish  by  every  method  known  to  the  rural 
districts  of  the  time — ^with  hook,  with  seine,  and  with  our 
hands.     If  a  big  fish  got  under  a  rock  and  we  could  not 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  19 

get  him  any  other  way,  we  would  break  the  rock  and  catch 
him.  In  the  winter  we  would  spear  them.  Occasionally 
we  caught  a  mud  turtle,  which  makes  fine  soup.  There 
were  no  game  and  fish  laws  then  to  pester  the  boys — 
and  men. 

In  passing  it  may  be  apropos  to  state  that  the  humble 
and  despised  mud  turtle  has  been  promoted  to  the  ranks 
of  the  aristocracy  among  crustaceans  and  is  now  shipped 
in  car-load  lots  from  our  Western  creeks  and  rivers  to 
New  York,  Boston,  and  other  Eastern  cities,  where  he  is 
made  to  do  duty  at  fancy  prices  as  genuine  diamond-back 
terrapin. 

We  learned  to  shoot  and  hunted  such  game  as  there 
was.  When  I  was  a  boy  everybody  in  Kentucky  could 
shoot,  generally  with  a  rifle.  Shotguns  were  not  much  in 
vogue. 

If  a  man  had  any  reputation  as  a  rifle-shot,  he  scorned 
to  shoot  a  squirrel  anywhere  except  in  the  head.  It  was 
the  Kentucky  and  Tennessee  squirrel  hunters  who  wrought 
such  fearful  havoc  in  Pakenham's  army  at  New  Orleans 
on  the  glorious  8th  of  January. 

Any  man  who  would  kill  game  with  a  shotgun  was 
considered  a  disreputable  pot-hunter.  We  hunted  squir- 
rels, rabbits,  quail,  raccoons,  'possums,  minks,  weasels, 
muskrats,  and  occasionally  a  fox.  A  lot  of  us  caught,  one 
night,  six  raccoons  in  one  tree — a  feat  which  was  the  talk 
of  the  neighborhood  for  a  long  time.  There  were  plenty  of 
'possums,  and  the  'possum,  when  cooked  the  right  way, 
baked  with  sweet  potatoes,  is  the  best  eating  in  the  world 
— a  dish  fit  to  set  before  a  king,  or  anybody  else. 

We  had  no  shows  and  theaters  to  attend,  but  we  had 
candy-puUings,  spelling-bees,  country  dances,  corn-shuck- 
ings,  log-rollings,  and  house-raisings. 

We  had  no  chocolates  and  other  expensive  sweetmeats 
fixed  up  in  fancy  boxes  and  bedizened  with  all  sorts  of 
multicolored  ribbons,  no  champagne  with  which  to  wash 


20       MY    QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

them  down,  no  English  walnuts  or  other  new-fangled  nuts, 
but  we  had  an  abundance  of  molasses  candy,  ginger  cakes, 
doughnuts,  maple  sugar,  black  walnuts,  hickory  nuts, 
hazelnuts,  cider,  both  sweet  and  hard,  together  with 
home-made  wines,  also  persimmon  beer.  We  did  not 
have  the  banana,  but  we  feasted  on  its  double  first  cousin, 
the  luscious  pawpaw. 

The  boys  had  no  cigarettes,  Turkish  or  other  kinds,  but 
they  had  what  was  far  better — sweet  corncob  pipes  and 
plenty  of  **long  green."  City-bred  Johnnies  may  turn  up 
their  noses  at  the  idea  of  extracting  enjoyment  out  of 
such  simple  things  as  above  set  forth,  but  we  hale  and 
lusty  "clodhoppers"  got  much  genuine  pleasure  out  of 
life;  and  our  sweethearts  were  fair  to  look  upon,  though 
clad  in  simple  calico,  gingham,  and  linsey-woolsey  instead 
of  silks,  satins,  and  velvets. 

As  many  readers  of  this  book  do  not  live  where  opos- 
sums abound,  it  may  be  pertinent  to  state  that  when  an 
opossum  is  surprised  or  scared,  he  lies  down,  curls  up, 
with  his  eyes  shut  as  though  dead,  hoping  to  escape  by 
that  ruse,  which  is  called  "playing  'possum."  They  dote 
on  persimmons,  which  are  not  toothsome  to  man  or  'pos- 
sum till  touched  by  frost. 

One  bright  moonshiny  night  in  the  latter  part  of  Octo- 
ber, when  I  was  about  ten  years  old,  I  was  going  home 
from  church,  and  passing  a  cluster  of  persimmon-trees  I 
found  one  of  the  biggest,  fattest  'possums  that  ever  per- 
ambulated a  forest  lying  in  the  road  and  "playing 
'possum." 

I  grabbed  him  by  the  tail  and  wagged  home  with  him, 
though  it  was  all  that  I  could  do  to  carry  him.  Next 
day  we  had  a  great  "'possum  dinner,"  and  no  crowned 
head  on  earth  ever  feasted  more  royally  or  greasily. 

I  was  exceedingly  proud  of  "my  catch,"  was  much 
complimented,  and  for  some  time  was  the  envy  of  all  of 
the  boys  in  the  vicinity. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  21 

I  did  not  wish  Colonel  Roosevelt  to  dub  me  a  "nature 
faker,"  consequently  I  am  glad  that  he  did  not  see  this 
story;  for  if  anybody  stated  a  fact  about  birds,  animals, 
or  fish,  no  matter  how  well  estabhshed,  but  which  he 
(Roosevelt)  did  not  know,  he  immediately  yelled  "nature 
faker"  at  the  top  of  his  voice,  with  the  maximum  of  vehe- 
mence and  a  superabundance  of  expletives.  Neverthe- 
less, it  is  a  queer  fact  that  while  a  raccoon  will  fight  a  dog 
— any  dog  or  any  number  of  dogs — to  the  death,  and  whip 
lots  of  them;  and  while  an  opossum  will  not  fight  a  dog — 
any  dog — an  opossum  will  fight  a  raccoon  every  time  he 
has  a  chance  and  come  off  victor  about  half  the  time.  I 
know  that's  true,  because  when  I  was  a  boy  I  saw  it  done 
time  and  again.  In  fact,  when  I  had  both  a  raccoon  and 
an  opossum  captives,  simultaneously,  I  have  thrown  them 
together  to  see  them  fight.  "Cruel  sport,"  some  esthete 
may  exclaim.  Yes,  but  no  more  cruel  than  cock-fighting 
or  dog-fighting  or  bear-baiting — sports  in  which  our 
ancestors  participated  enthusiastically. 

Even  so  illustrious  a  person  as  Andrew  Jackson,  of 
blessed  and  glorious  memory,  not  only  raised  race-horses 
and  ran  them,  betting  on  the  result,  but  he  bred  game- 
chickens  of  noblest  strain,  which  could  lick  anything  wear- 
ing feathers  in  Tennessee.  While  he  was  President,  he 
had  sent  to  him  from  the  Hermitage  a  lot  of  chickens  to 
be  pitted  against  Virginia  games  at  Bladensburg;  but, 
alack  and  alas !  the  long  trip  or  change  of  water  or  some- 
thing else  so  influenced  the  Hermitage  cocks  that  they 
would  not  fight  at  all — much  to  the  disgust  of  the  con- 
queror of  Gen.  Sir  Edward  Pakenham  and  the  veterans 
of  the  Peninsular  War. 

Strange  as  it  may  seem,  the  name  of  "'Possum  Policy" 
was  given  to  that  great  political  movement  in  Missouri, 
headed  by  Gen.  Frank  P.  Blair,  his  cousin.  Gov.  Benjamin 
Gratz  Brown,  Gen.  John  B.  Henderson,  and  Gen.  Carl 
Schurz,   Col.   David   Patterson   Dyer,  Col.   George  W. 


22       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

Anderson,  Gov.  Charles  P.  Johnson,  and  Colonel  Fyan, 
and  which  overthrew  the  Republican  party  in  Missouri 
and  eventuated  in  the  "Liberal  Republican"  upheaval 
and  the  nomination  of  Horace  Greeley  for  President,  in 
1872. 

It  was  denominated  the  "Tossum  Policy"  because  the 
Democrats  agreed  to  "play  'possum"  by  lying  low,  not 
nominating  candidates  of  their  own  for  state  offices,  and 
supporting  the  "Liberal  Republican"  candidates, 
worked  Hke  a  charm  and  made  Benjamin  Gratz  Brown 
Governor.  He  was  one  of  the  most  scholarly  governors 
Missouri  ever  had,  as  is  attested  by  the  fact  that  he  wrote 
a  book  on  higher  mathematics  as  a  mental  recreation. 

Another  thing  from  which  we  extracted  some  pleasure 
was  a  shooting-match,  for  turkeys  and  fresh  beef.  We 
not  only  got  amusement  out  of  it,  but  it  helped  keep  us 
in  trim  as  rifle-shots — considered  a  great  accomplishment 
at  that  time  and  place,  though  now  not  so  highly  prized 
as  formerly — more's  the  pity.  I  am  aware  that  some 
very  good  people  frowned  on  the  shooting-match,  but 
nevertheless  most  men  and  boys  regarded  it  highly  and 
cherished  it  as  an  innocent  pastime,  which  I  think  it  was. 

Another  great  sport  was  the  cutting  down  of  bee-trees. 
Some  of  those  big,  tall  Kentucky  poplars  contained  an 
amazing  quantity  of  honey  of  the  finest  quahty.  The 
way  we  youngsters  feasted  on  such  joyous  occasions  is 
extremely  pleasant  in  the  retrospect  through  the  vista  of 
years. 

Still  another  most  delightful  function  was  "stirring  oflT" 
maple  sugar  by  night  in  the  sugar  camp.  It  was  a  great 
lark  for  men  and  women,  boys  and  girls.  There  never 
was  invented  in  this  world,  or  discovered,  a  more  enjoy- 
able sweetmeat  than  maple  sugar.  What  a  pity  it  is  that 
the  sugar-maple  tree — beautiful  and  lovely — is  as  nearly 
extinct  as  the  buflPalo.  The  wild  pigeon  is  completely 
gone,  and  the  sugar-tree  is  going  rapidly.     One  of  my 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  23 

constituents,  Charles  W.  Davis,  of  my  home  town,  is 
applying  for  a  patent  on  imitation  maple  sugar.  I  hope 
he  secures  his  patent  and  gets  by  or  through  the  restric- 
tions of  the  Pure  Food  laws.  If  so,  he  will  be  a  public 
benefactor.  Even  Lucullus  never  ate  anything  more  de- 
licious than  maple  syrup  and  hot  cakes. 

It  was  a  delight  to  get  out  at  night  in  the  woods  with 
a  pack  of  hounds  and  chase  the  game  until  we  were  so 
tired  we  could  hardly  drag  ourselves  to  bed.  It  was 
always  a  great  event  in  the  life  of  a  country  boy  when  he 
was  considered  old  enough  to  go  out  with  the  hounds. 
He  knew  then  that  he  was  verging  close  onto  manhood. 
Lord  Byron  says: 

*Tis  sweet  to  hear  the  watch-dog's  honest  bark 
Bay  deep-mouth'd  welcome  as  we  draw  near  home. 

He  was  entirely  correct,  and  he  might  have  added 
truthfully  that  there  is  no  sweeter  music  to  a  healthy 
boy's  ear  than  the  voice  of  a  pack  of  hounds  in  full  cry 
at  night,  in  a  forest  primeval.  I  heard,  when  I  was  a  boy, 
Moses  E.  Lard,  one  of  the  most  eloquent  of  American 
preachers,  say  that  in  the  pulpit,  and  he  was  entirely  cor- 
rect in  so  speaking. 

My  first  great  sorrow  was  that  when  I  was  a  small  boy 
some  of  the  neighbors  took  my  dog  Ranger,  part 
shepherd  and  part  bull-terrier,  and  shot  him  to  death  on 
a  trumped-up  charge  of  killing  sheep.  I  was  utterly  dis- 
consolate for  many  days  and  never  did  forgive  those  men. 

I  hereby  introduce,  as  my  sentiments.  Senator  George 
Graham  Vest's  beautiful  Oration  on  the  Dog.  It  was 
delivered  before  a  Missouri  jury  in  a  lawsuit  involving  a 
dog: 

Gentlemen  of  the  jury,— The  best  friend  a  man  has  in  this  world 
may  turn  against  him  and  become  his  enemy.  His  son  and  daughter 
that  he  has  reared  with  loving  care  may  become  ungrateful.     Those 


24       MY   QUARTER   CENTURY   OF 

who  are  nearest  and  dearest  to  us,  those  whom  we  trust  with  our 
happiness  and  our  good  name,  may  become  traitors  to  their  faith. 
The  money  that  a  man  has  he  may  lose.  It  flies  away  from  him 
when  he  may  need  it  most.  Man's  reputation  may  be  sacrificed  in 
a  moment  of  ill-considered  action.  The  people  who  are  prone  to  fall 
on  their  knees  and  do  us  honor  when  success  is  with  us  may  be  the 
first  to  throw  the  stone  of  malice  when  failure  settles  its  cloud  upon 
our  heads.  The  one  absolutely  unselfish  friend  a  man  may  have  in 
this  selfish  world,  the  one  that  never  deserts  him,  the  one  that  never 
proves  ungrateful  or  treacherous,  is  the  dog. 

Gentlemen  of  the  jury,  a  man's  dog  stands  by  him  in  prosperity 
and  poverty,  in  health  and  in  sickness.  He  will  sleep  on  the  cold 
ground  when  the  wintry  winds  blow  and  the  snow  drives  fiercely,  if 
only  he  may  be  near  his  master's  side.  He  will  kiss  the  hand  that  has 
no  food  to  offer,  he  will  lick  the  wounds  and  sores  that  come  in  encoun- 
ter with  the  roughness  of  the  world.  He  guards  the  sleep  of  his 
pauper  master  as  if  he  were  a  prince. 

When  all  other  friends  desert,  he  remains.  When  riches  take  wings 
and  reputation  falls  to  pieces,  he  is  as  constant  in  his  love  as  the  sun 
in  its  journey  through  the  heavens.  If  fortune  drives  the  master  forth 
an  outcast  into  the  world,  friendless  and  homeless,  the  faithful  dog 
asks  no  higher  privilege  than  that  of  accompanying  him,  to  guard  him 
against  danger,  to  fight  against  his  enemies,  and  when  the  last  scene 
of  all  comes,  and  death  takes  his  master  in  its  embrace  and  his  body  is 
laid  away  in  the  cold  ground,  no  matter  if  all  other  friends  pursue 
their  way,  there  by  his  graveside  will  the  noble  dog  be  found,  his  head 
between  his  paws  and  his  eyes  sad,  but  open,  in  alert  watchfulness 
faithful  and  true,  even  unto  death. 

Apropos  of  Senator  Vest's  Eulogy  on  the  Dog,  it  is  a 
queer  fact  that  while  that  gem  of  oratory  is  frequently 
quoted  and  more  frequently  referred  to,  his  masterful 
orations,  which  were  numerous  and  on  many  subjects, 
and  of  the  most  approved  order  of  excellence,  full  of  wit, 
humor,  sarcasm,  and  eloquence,  have  been  sadly  neglected 
by  those  editing  collections  of  speeches.  He  was  a  giant 
on  the  stump  and  had  no  superior  as  a  debater  in  the 
Senate,  but  it  looks  as  though  his  dog  speech  is  the  one 
which  will  transmit  his  fame  as  an  orator  to  coming 
generations.  That  is  a  pity,  for  his  best  speeches  are  well 
worthy  of  profound  study  by  the  youth  of  the  land. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  25 

He  stands  in  relationship  to  his  speeches  about  as 
Robert  Southey  does  to  his  poems.  Southey  wrote  sev- 
eral long  epics  on  which  he  believed  that  his  fame  would 
rest,  but  nobody  reads  them.  He  is  kept  in  memory  as 
a  poet  by  such  minor  productions  as  **The  Battle  of  Blen- 
heim/' "How  Does  the  Water  Come  Down  at  Lodore?*' 
and  "Mary,  the  Maid  of  the  Inn." 

Many  years  after  they  killed  my  dog  I  had  the  pleasure 
of  securing  an  opinion  from  the  St.  Louis  Court  of  Appeals, 
after  a  hot  fight,  to  the  effect  that  a  man  in  Missouri  can 
be  compelled  to  pay  damages  for  killing  a  valuable  dog. 
That's  the  rule  in  Missouri  now,  and  it  gave  me  a  vast 
deal  of  pleasure  to  secure  that  decision.  It  avenged  my 
dog,  slain  when  I  was  a  barefooted  boy  in  Kentucky. 

A  Kentucky  boy  who  would  not  run  a  horse-race  when 
he  had  a  chance  was  considered  too  slow  and  spiritless 
ever  to  amount  to  much  and  was  dubbed  a  "sissy." 
There  was  no  talk  among  the  boys  with  whom  I  associ- 
ated about  "athletics."  We  were  athletes  by  force  of 
circumstances  and  gloried  in  the  fact  when  Hfe  was  young. 
Though  our  heads  are  blossoming  as  the  almond-tree,  we 
glory  in  the  recollection  of  it  yet. 

We  extracted  much  pleasure  out  of  the  mere  fact  of 
living  and  in  performing  our  labors  and  in  practising  our 
rude  sports.  We  might  almost  have  appropriated  as  a 
description  of  ourselves,  with  a  change  in  latitude  and 
longitude,  Tennyson's  lines  in  "Locksley  Hall"  about 
certain  boys  created  by  his  poetic  fancy: 

Iron-jointed,  supple-sinewM,  they  shall  dive,  and  they  shall  run, 
Catch  the  wild  goat  by  the  hair,  and  hurl  their  lances  in  the  sun; 
Whistle  back  the  parrot's  call,  and  leap  the  rainbows  of  the  brooks. 
Not  with  blinded  eyesight  poring  over  miserable  books. 

Major  Joe  Bagstock,  of  pleasant  memory,  as  descriptio 
personce  of  himself,  was  wont  to  boast:    "Tough,   sir. 


26       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

devilish  tough  1"  and  so  were  we  Kentucky  boys — physi- 
cally, of  course. 

Judge  WiUiam  H.  Biggs,  of  the  St.  Louis  Court  of 
Appeals,  gave  this  philosophical  explanation  of  the  reason 
why  preceding  generations  were  stronger  and  robuster 
than  the  men  and  women  of  to-day.  He  said:  **In  the 
old  times,  children  were  reared  under  such  hard  conditions 
that  all  the  weak  and  dehcate  ones  died  and  only  the 
fittest  and  strongest  physically  survived.''  Perhaps  the 
judge  was  correct.     Who  knows? 

Whether  Judge  Biggs  was  right  or  wrong,  the  Kentucky 
boys  who  survived  grew  into  lusty,  strapping  big  men. 
Col.  Theodore  Roosevelt,  in  his  Life  of  Col.  Thomas 
Hart  Benton,  says  that  by  actual  measurement  the 
Kentuckians  were  the  largest  men  in  the  Union  Army. 
The  chances  are  that  they  were  also  the  largest  among 
the  Confederates.  Limestone  accounts  for  it.  They  eat 
it,  drink  it,  breathe  it. 

Sleigh-riding,  now  unhappily  out  of  fashion  to  a  large 
extent,  was  a  favorite  winter  sport.  When  the  snow  car- 
peted the  earth  and  frost  was  in  the  air,  we  all  tried  it. 
Of  course  we  had  no  fine  sleighs  as  the  city  chaps  have 
and  no  sleigh-bells.  Instead  we  used  cow-bells  to  warn 
folks  that  we  were  coming.  We  made  our  own  sleighs 
out  of  poles  and  a  few  pieces  of  plank  or  slabs.  Having 
the  "beautiful  snow"  and  his  rude  sleigh,  a  young  man 
would  take  his  best  girl  and  make  love  to  her  beneath  the 
stars — deep  snows  and  full  moons  were  great  aids  to 
matrimony  among  the  rustics — and  what  was  best  of  all 
those  marriages  generally  lasted  so  long  as  life  endured. 
Divorces  were  rare  and  divorce  courts  idle. 

Part  of  my  duties  in  working  for  Call  was  to  feed  thirty 
young  mules  and  an  old  blue  donkey  named  Taylor,  in 
honor  of  "Old  Rough  and  Ready,"  hero  of  Buena  Vista, 
and  President  of  the  United  States. 

One  morning  while  feeding  them  I  w^s  studying  out 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  27 

some  problem  in  arithmetic  and  gave  Taylor  the  corn  for 
the  thirty  mules  and  the  thirty  mules  the  corn  for  Taylor. 
Just  as  I  was  sitting  down  to  breakfast  by  candle-light, 
it  flashed  across  my  mind  that  I  had  exchanged  their 
rations,  and  I  hot-footed  it  to  the  barn.  Taylor  had 
eaten  ten  ears  of  corn  and  was  beginning  on  the  eleventh, 
with  appetite  unappeased.  If  I  had  not  remembered  in 
the  nick  of  time,  Call  would  have  been  minus  one  donkey 
before  set  of  sun.  The  moral:  Feeding  donkeys  and 
mules  and  wrestling  with  mathematics  are  incompatible 
operations. 

The  almost  universal  habit  of  rural  Kentucky  boys  was 
to  go  barefoot  from  about  the  middle  of  April  to  the 
middle  of  November.  A  majority  of  the  girls  did  likewise. 
This  habit  had  two  results — larger  feet  and  stone-bruises. 
Those  who  never  suffered  from  stone-bruises  have  been 
exceedingly  fortunate,  as  I  can  testify  from  experience. 
They  never  kill  anybody,  but  they  cause  howling,  loss  of 
sleep,  and  much  profane  swearing.  Nothing  that  I  know 
of  is  so  painful  unless  it  be  acute  neuralgia. 

To  those  who  trip  into  a  store  and  in  a  few  moments 
purchase  a  pair  of  handsome,  well-fitting  shoes,  it  will  be 
a  surprise  to  learn  how  country  folks  were  fitted  out  with 
foot-gear  in  that  far-away  day  among  the  Kentucky  hills. 
Along  early  in  the  fall  the  head  of  the  family  would  buy 
the  leather  sufficient  to  furnish  one  pair  of  shoes  to  each 
of  his  household,  or,  in  the  case  of  the  men  and  the  larger 
boys,  a  pair  of  boots — one  pair  each  and  no  more.  Then 
he  would  employ  an  itinerant  shoemaker  to  come  to  his 
house  with  the  implements  of  his  trade  to  work  up  the 
leather  goods.  Of  course  a  boy  who  sported  red-top  boots 
was  the  envy  of  all  his  less  fortunate  neighbors.  Those 
fairly  well-to-do  purchased  their  Sunday  footwear  from 
an  established  shoemaker  or  at  the  store.  This  was  done 
much  more  by  the  women  and  girls  than  by  the  men  and 
boys.     I  knew  one  man,  William  Carrier  by  name,  an  old 


28       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

bachelor,  somewhat  of  a  dandy,  but  close  as  the  bark  on  a 
beech-tree,  who  was  the  proud  owner  of  a  pair  of  fine  cus- 
tom-made boots,  but  who  did  not  propose  to  waste  them 
by  unnecessary  use.  So  for  his  jaunts  to  church  and  about 
the  neighborhood  he  devised  this  scheme  of  economy: 
he  would  walk  to  the  immediate  vicinity  of  his  objective 
point,  wearing  his  coarse  bull-hide  shoes  and  carrying  in 
his  hand  his  fine  and  shining  boots,  shined  with  Mason's 
blacking.  Then,  discarding  his  shoes,  he  would  don  his 
boots  and  make  his  grand  entry. 

Most  folks,  especially  those  reared  among  negroes,  are 
more  or  less  superstitious.  Even  some  men  and  women 
who  are  generally  regarded  as  level-headed  have  their 
pet  superstitions.  For  instance,  John  Call,  of  near  Mack- 
ville,  Kentucky,  to  whom  my  father  hired  me  out  to 
work  on  a  farm  when  I  was  a  lad,  was  one  of  the  most 
successful  farmers  in  that  vicinity,  but  he  had  a  super- 
stition to  the  effect  that,  if  anybody  carried  a  steel  pitch- 
fork through  the  house,  some  member  of  the  family  would 
soon  die.  One  awfully  hot  day  I  had  been  shocking  hay 
on  the  north  side  of  his  house,  and,  having  finished  there, 
was  to  continue  on  the  south  side.  So  in  order  to  save 
time  I  started  to  walk  through  the  house  with  my  pitch- 
fork on  my  shoulder,  instead  of  making  a  detour  of  the 
house.  He  saw  me  and  got  into  a  towering  rage,  swear- 
ing that  it  was  bad  luck,  and  he  ordered  me  peremptorily 
to  go  around  the  house.  The  performance  appeared  to 
me  to  be  so  utterly  preposterous  that  I  grinned  in  his 
face  and  started  ahead  on  the  way  I  was  going.  He 
was  blazing  mad,  rushed  toward  me,  shaking  his  fist, 
vowing  that  somebody  would  die,  and  that  unless  I 
turned  back  he  would  lick  me,  good  and  plenty.  By 
that  time  my  dander  was  up.  I  lowered  my  pitchfork 
and  said: 

"If  you  lay  your  finger  on  me  somebody  will  die  very 
suddenly  and  it  will  be  you" 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  29 

He  took  me  at  my  word,  did  not  attempt  to  thrash  me, 
and  I  went  on  my  way  triumphantly. 

The  belief  in  the  bad  luck  attaching  to  the  number 
thirteen  is  widespread  and  persistent.  I  care  nothing 
about  it,  would  as  lief  sleep  in  room  thirteen  as  any 
other,  and  would  not  object  to  belonging  to  the  ** Thirteen 
Club."  But  I  fully  recognize  the  fact  that  thousands, 
perhaps  millions,  of  more  or  less  intelligent  people  regard 
thirteen  as  a  hoodoo,  and  that  it  is  well  to  pay  some 
attention  to  other  people's  whimsicalities.  The  morning 
after  Joseph  Wingate  Folk  was  nominated  for  Governor 
of  Missouri  I  invited  him,  together  with  his  wife  and 
some  other  friends,  to  take  breakfast  with  me  in  the 
up-stairs  dining-room  of  the  Union  Station  in  St.  Louis. 
When  we  were  seated  at  the  table,  somebody  in  great 
trepidation  whispered  to  me  that  there  were  thirteen  of 
us!  I  counted  the  company,  and  sure  enough  there  were 
thirteen,  one  of  whom  was  a  reporter  for  The  Globe- 
Democrat,  a  Republican  organ.  I  didn't  care  a  straw 
about  the  number,  but  I  did  not  propose  to  give  that 
bright  Globe-Democrat  reporter  a  chance  to  handicap  Folk 
with  the  story  that  he  was  beginning  his  race  under  the 
thirteen  hoodoo.  So  I  quietly  excused  myself  and  went 
down  to  the  lower  floor,  where  usually  I  would  see  from 
one  to  fifty  acquaintances,  in  order  to  pick  up  a  four- 
teenth member  for  my  breakfast-party,  but,  strange  to 
relate,  not  an  acquaintance  was  in  sight.  A  strapping 
big  good-looking  policeman,  whom  I  had  never  clapped 
eyes  on  before,  sauntered  along,  swinging  his  billy.  I 
accosted  him,  and  to  his  evident  surprise  invited  him  to 
breakfast.  He  asked  me  the  wherefore  of  the  invitation. 
I  told  him  that  that  was  none  of  his  business  and  that  it 
was  enough  for  him  to  know  that  he  would  get  a  cracking 
good  feed  free,  in  recherche  company,  and  that  it  would 
be  a  favor  to  me.  He  wouldn't  accept  till  I  told  him 
'  my  name.     I  took  him  up-stairs,  introduced  him  as  one 


30       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

of  my  ex-constituents  who  was  on  "the  force,"  and  all 
went  merry  as  a  marriage-bell. 

"Airs  well  that  ends  well." 

The  very  first  thing  I  ever  heard  about  a  President  or  a 
railroad  came  about  in  this  way  when  I  was  a  little  tad 
six  years  old:  my  father  was  dolling  up  his  fine  saddle- 
horse  named  Traveler.  I  was  much  interested  in  the 
process  and  asked  him  where  he  was  going.  He  replied: 
"To  hear  Judge  Barbour  make  a  speech  for  James 
Buchanan,  who  is  running  for  President."  As  about  the 
first  thing  a  Kentucky  boy  of  that  era  ever  knew  about 
was  a  horse-race,  and  supposing  that  Buchanan's  "run- 
ning for  President"  had  some  connection  with  "the  sport 
of  kings,"  I  expressed  the  childish  hope  that  he  would 
have  as  fine  a  mount  as  Traveler.  My  father  kindly 
explained  to  me  that  candidates  for  the  Presidency  did 
not  run  horses,  but  rode  on  railroad  trains  which  ran 
twenty  or  thirty  miles  an  hour.  He  evidently  had 
momentarily  forgotten  his  patron  saint,  Andrew  Jack- 
son, and  his  famous  horse,  Truxton. 

The  next  lesson  in  my  political  education  was  the  tre- 
mendous huUaballoo  made  about  a  brilHant  but  almost 
beardless  boy  named  John  Young  Brown  beating  a  vet- 
eran statesman,  Joshua  Jewett,  for  Congress,  in  1859. 
Brown,  being  only  twenty-four,  could  not  be  sworn  in 
until  the  second  session  of  the  Congress  to  which  he  was 
elected.  Many  years  after  he  served  two  or  three  terms 
in  the  House,  finally  achieving  the  Kentucky  governor- 
ship. When  he  defeated  Jewett  he  was  acclaimed  a 
wonder  and  was  the  resounding  theme  of  every  Kentucky 
tongue.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  he  was  a  brilliant  and  able 
man. 

I  take  it  that  few,  if  any,  of  his  admiring  constituents 
knew  that  William  Pitt  the  Younger  was  Premier  of 
Great  Britain  at  twenty-four,  and  that  at  that  age  his 
famous  rival,  Charles  James  Fox,  was  a  seasoned  veteran 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  31 

of  the  House  of  Commons.  A  few  others,  R.  Graham 
Frost,  of  St.  Louis,  among  them,  have  been  elected  to 
the  House  before  they  had  attained  the  constitutional 
age. 

John  Randolph  of  Roanoke  never  had  any  beard,  so 
he  looked  younger  than  he  really  was;  looked  so  young, 
in  fact,  that  when  he  presented  his  credentials  the  clerk 
of  the  House  asked  him  how  old  he  was.  The  fiery  and 
haughty  Virginian  tartly  replied:  "Go  ask  the  people 
who  sent  me  to  Congress,"  and  there  the  conversation 
was  dropped,  suddenly. 


CHAPTER  II 

Children  of  my  father  and  mother — Marriage — Children — Early  housekeeping 
— Twelve  thousand  people  attend  Genevieve's  wedding — Bennett  learns  to 
ride  on  a  Jersey  cow — Value  of  ponies  to  children — Birth  of  my  grandson 
celebrated  by  the  House — It  makes  him  a  fine  present — Kindness  of  Mr. 
Mann,  the  republican  leader — Tom  Bodine's  tender  article — The  dear 
little  boy's  death. 

l-WO   GIRLS   AND   A    BOY 

TO  my  father  and  mother,  three  children  were  born. 
They  were  Margaret,  whose  pet  name  was  "Peggie,'* 
which  was  generally  shortened  to  "Peg."  She  was  born 
in  1848  and  died  a  short  time  before  I  was  born,  on 
March  7,  1850. 

I  never  had  a  brother,  which  I  have  regretted  all  of 
my  days. 

My  other  sister,  Elizabeth,  was  born  March  5,  1852. 
She  married  the  Rev.  J.  J.  Haley,  a  prominent  preacher 
and  writer  in  the  Church  of  the  Disciples,  sometimes 
called  the  Christian  Church,  or  sometimes  the  Campbell- 
ite  Church.     They  now  live  at  Santa  Cruz,  CaHfornia. 

She  began  teaching  school  when  she  was  only  thirteen, 
while,  as  elsewhere  stated,  I  began  teaching  before  I  was 
fifteen.  That  was  the  only  way  we  had  to  make  even 
the  minimum  amount  of  money,  eked  out  by  what  little 
our  father  could  give  us  out  of  his  meager  earnings,  in 
order  to  obtain  an  education.  She  taught  at  intervals 
till  1874,  when  she  married  Brother  Haley.  Their  honey- 
moon trip  was  to  Sydney,  Australia,  where  Brother  Haley 
was  to  be  pastor  of  the  biggest  congregation  of  the  Dis% 
ciples  in  Australia,  on  the  recommendation  of  Robert 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  33 

Graham,  one  of  nature's  noblemen,  president  of  Transyl- 
vania University  and  subsequently  president  of  Hocker 
Female  College.  His  friendship  has  rested  on  me  Hke 
a  benediction  all  my  life. 

When  we  were  struggling  to  get  an  education  my  sister 
and  I  helped  each  other  all  we  could  and  did  good  team- 
work. When  she  had  money  and  I  needed  it,  I  got  it; 
and  when  I  had  any  and  she  needed  it,  she  got  it.  Of 
course,  neither  of  us  nor  both  of  us  ever  had  much,  as 
rural  school-teachers,  not  only  in  Kentucky,  but  every- 
where, were  poorly  paid  in  those  days.  While  the  situa- 
tion has  much  improved  lately,  they  are  not  well  enough 
compensated,  even  yet.  In  many  cities  and  towns  police- 
men are  paid  more  to  crack  skulls  than  teachers  arc  paid 
to  form  the  minds  of  children. 

My  sister  has  done  a  noble  work  in  the  world — has 
worn  herself  out  at  it — and  has  been  foremost  in  charity 
and  good  deeds.  She  has  helped  many  a  poor,  friendless 
boy  and  girl  in  the  fight  for  a  better  and  larger  life.  As 
her  reward,  she  has  the  love  and  benedictions  of  thousands 
in  Australia,  England,  America,  and  New  Zealand,  in  all 
of  which  countries  she  proved  a  wise,  unselfish,  and 
valuable  helpmeet  for  her  husband — a  blessing  to  his 
parishioners. 

On  the  14th  of  December,  1881,  I  was  married  to 
Miss  Genevieve  Davis  Bennett,  of  Callaway  County, 
Missouri.  Her  father,  whom  I  never  knew,  was  from 
Madison  County,  Kentucky,  and  his  ancestors  were  from 
Maryland.  Her  mother,  one  of  the  finest  women  I  ever 
saw,  was  a  Kentuckian  named  McAfee,  whose  mother  was 
a  Hamilton.  They  were  among  the  earliest  settlers  in 
Mercer  County,  Kentucky,  having  come  in  with  Daniel 
Boone.     They  constituted  a  large  and  powerful  clan. 

When  I  was  a  boy,  a  lively  young  man  named  Mundy 
was  running  against  J.  J.  McAfee,  nicknamed  *"  Ginger," 
for  the  Legislature  in  Mercer  County.     I  asked  my  father 

Vol.  I.— 3 


34       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

bow  they  would  come  out.  He  replied:  "McAfee  will 
win,  hands  down.  Mundy  is  a  fool  to  be  running  against 
McAfee,  who  is  blood-kin  to  one-third  of  the  people  in 
the  county.''  On  that  occasion,  at  least,  my  father  was 
a  prophet. 

My  wife's  grandfather,  George  McAfee,  fought  under 
Harrison  at  the  River  Thames  and  under  Jackson  at 
New  Orleans.  On  her  mother's  side  of  the  house  she  is 
closely*  related  to  Gen.  Robert  B.  McAfee,  Lieutenant- 
Governor  of  Kentucky  and  Envoy  Extraordinary  and 
Minister  Plenipotentiary  to  one  of  the  South  American 
states,  also  to  Joseph  Davies,  who  died  a  hero's  death 
at  Tippecanoe  and  for  whom  three  or  four  counties  are 
named;  also  to  Dr.  John  McAfee,  father  of  Park  College, 
Missouri.  On  her  father's  side  she  is  a  cousin  to  Gov. 
James  Bennett  McCreary  of  Kentucky. 

We  have  had  four  hale,  heart)^,  handsome  children  born 
to  us — Little  Champ  and  Anne  Hamilton — both  of  whom 
died  in  infancy,  Bennett  Champ,  formerly  the  parlia- 
mentary clerk  of  the  House  and  afterward  a  colonel  in 
our  army  in  France,  and  Genevieve,  wife  of  James  M. 
Thomson,  publisher  of  The  New  Orleans  Item. 

We  have  been  very  happy  in  our  children.  Neither  of 
them  has  given  me  a  moment's  trouble.  A  sweet  baby 
is  the  greatest  luxury  in  nature.  When  Bennett  was 
twenty  years  old  he  was  delegate  to  a  state  convention 
and  stumped  my  Congressional  District  for  me,  making 
as  many  speeches  as  he  could  without  too  much  neglecting 
his  duties  at  the  University  of  Missouri,  where  he  was 
then  a  student.  The  people  treated  him  very  generously 
and  praised  him  very  enthusiastically,  a  fact  of  which  I 
was  proud,  indeed,  and  for  which  I  was  profoundly  grate- 
ful. We  have  it  from  highest  authority  that  the  sins  of 
the  father  are  visited  upon  the  children.  I  rejoice  in  the 
fact  that  the  affection  bestowed  upon  the  father  some- 
times descends  to  the  children. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  35 

When  we  were  first  married,  and  I  was  scuffling  hard 
to  secure  a  foothold  at  the  overcrowded  bar,  my  wife 
helped  me  out  by  teaching  in  Pike  College,  at  Bowling 
Green. 

I  milked  the  cow,  worked  the  garden,  carried  in  the 
wood  and  water,  purchased  the  supplies,  made  the  fires, 
and  aided  her  all  I  could  in  the  housework.  She  didn't 
know  how  to  cook,  but  by  assiduous  study  of  cook-books 
and  practising  their  precepts  she  became  one  of  the  best 
cooks  I  ever  knew. 

Those  were  happy  days  in  a  little  four-roomed  cottage, 
notwithstanding  our  extreme  poverty. 

She  is  an  old-school  Presbyterian,  the  church  of  her 
family  since  the  days  of  Calvin  and  Knox,  while  I  am  a 
member  of  the  Disciples'  Church,  the  church  of  my 
father  and  mother.  She  had  the  children  sprinkled,  while 
I  went  with  her  and  helped  her.  Bennett  was  sprinkled 
with  water  out  of  the  River  Jordan. 

We  have  kept  peace  in  the  family  by  not  arguing  about 
religion.  When  she  goes  to  her  church  I  go  along,  and 
feel  at  home;  when  I  go  to  my  church,  she  keeps  me 
company.  Our  children  attend  both  churches  and  are 
at  home  in  both. 

Bennett  was  born  on  January  8,  1890 — St.  Jackson's 
day — a  fact  of  which  he  and  I  both  are  proud.  When  he 
was  four  or  five  years  old  I  owned  a  very  old  and  very 
fine  registered  Jersey  cow,  almost  a  perfect  ringer  for 
Europa,  for  many  years  the  champion  butter  cow  of 
the  world.  Because  she  was  spotted  we  called  her 
Piedie.  She  did  not  give  a  great  quantity  of  milk, 
but  what  she  did  give  was  the  richest  I  ever  tasted. 
When  I  went  to  milk  her,  my  Uttle  boy,  Bennett,  accom- 
panied me,  carrying  his  little  tin  cup,  which  I  would  fill 
with  the  rich,  warm  milk,  which  he  drank.  I  don't  know 
what  the  doctors  thought  about  it,  but  my  opinion  has 
always  been,  and  is  now,  that  it  was  good  for  him. 


36       MY    QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

His  first  lessons  in  riding  were  on  that  old  cow.  His 
little  legs  stuck  out  almost  horizontally,  but  she  was  as 
gentle  as  a  dog  and  never  tried  to  throw  him  off.  He  has 
ridden  sundry  war  horses  both  in  America  and  in  France, 
but  I  doubt  if  he  has  ever  ridden  one  that  gave  him  so 
much  pleasure  as,  when  a  little  tad,  he  rode  the  old  Jersey 
cow  Piedie. 

For  the  benefit  of  young  fathers  and  mothers,  I  give  it 
as  my  deliberate  opinion  that  the  best  money  I  ever  spent 
on  my  children  was  for  ponies.  Thereby  they  learned 
to  ride  like  Indians — a  very  useful  accomplishment.  It 
kept  them  out  in  the  open  air  and  in  the  health-giving 
sunshine.  It  prevented  their  forming  bad  habits,  and 
gave  them  fine  bodies  and  perfect  health.  I  taught  them 
how  to  feed,  curry,  and  saddle  the  ponies,  which  was  use- 
ful knowledge. 

As  soon  as  Bennett  was  strong  enough  to  hoid  up  a 
shotgun,  I  bought  him  the  best  in  the  market  and  taught 
him  how  to  shoot  it,  and  he  became  a  good  wing-shot — 
another  valuable  accomplishment  which  gave  him  much 
outdoor  recreation.  When  he  became  old  enough  to 
trust  with  a  pistol,  I  got  him  a  fine  target  pistol  and 
showed  him  how  to  use  it.  I  remembered,  then,  what 
gave  the  Confederates  such  a  bulge  on  the  Union  soldiers 
at  the  beginning  of  the  war  between  the  States  was  that 
nearly  every  Southerner  knew  how  to  ride  a  horse  and 
how  to  shoot;  consequently,  from  the  first,  they  made 
extraordinarily  fine  cavalrymen. 

In  his  book  Destruction  and  Reconstruction — by  long 
odds  the  most  classical  book  ever  written  about  that 
war — Gen.  "Dick"  Taylor,  son  of  Gen.  Zachary  Taylor, 
says  that  at  the  battle  of  Port  Republic,  when  Stonewall 
Jackson  defeated  General  Banks,  they  found  Federal 
cavalrymen  sitting  dead  on  their  horses.  They  had  been 
strapped  to  the  saddles  so  that  they  could  not  fall  off! 
What  good  were  such   cavalrymen?     Farther  along  in 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  37 

the  war  the  Northern  men  became  more*  expert  horsemen 
and  that  very  much  improved  their  cavalry  arm  of  the 
service. 

Genevieve  was  born  on  Thanksgiving  Day,  1894.  As 
a  matter  of  fact,  the  anniversary  of  her  birth  falls  on 
Thanksgiving  only  once  in  six  or  seven  years.  When  she 
was  a  little  child  she  always  celebrated  the  entire  week. 

On  the  last  day  of  June,  191 5,  four  months  before  she 
was  twenty-one,  she  was  married  to  Col.  James  M.  Thom- 
son, publisher  and  editor  of  The  New  Orleans  Iteniy  the 
largest  daily  paper  in  the  city.  I  postponed  the  wedding 
as  long  as  I  could,  because  she  was  so  young  and  not 
because  I  was  opposed  to  Colonel  Thomson,  who  is  a 
splendid  man,  mentally  and  physically. 

After  the  day  was  set  it  was  a  serious  question  whether 
to  have  the  wedding  in  Washington,  where  it  would  have 
been  more  convenient  and  where  we  have  a  host  of  friends, 
or  at  Bowling  Green,  Missouri,  her  childhood  home.  It 
is  a  town  of  only  twenty-five  hundred  inhabitants  and 
therefore  not  well  adapted  to  entertain  a  big  crowd.  She 
selected  BowHng  Green,  saying  that  we  owed  it  to  our 
old  neighbors  and  friends — an  opinion  in  which  her 
mother,  father,  and  brother  concurred. 

The  House  of  Representatives  presented  her  with  a 
magnificent  diamond  necklace. 

We  were  puzzled  about  inviting  our  friends  in  Missouri. 
Nearly  all  the  people  in  the  state  are  our  friends.  The 
physical  labor  of  sending  invitations  to  all  would  have 
been  enormous,  and  the  expense  considerable;  so,  after 
discussing  it,  we  concluded  that  the  only  sensible  way 
was  for  Mrs.  Clark  and  me  to  publish  a  notice  in  the 
newspapers,  inviting  all  of  our  Missouri  friends.  While 
that  was  a  crude  performance  and  not  recommended  in 
any  book  on  etiquette,  it  worked  like  a  charm;  for  they 
came,  twelve  thousand  strong,  and  if  the  heavy  rains 
had  not  raised  the  streams  and  turned  dirt  roads  into 


38       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

quagmires,  the  crowd  would  have  been  much  larger.  Of 
course  v/e  sent  regulation  tickets  to  a  multitude  of  non- 
Missouri  friends. 

It  was  an  outdoor  ceremony  on  a  lovely  June  day.  It 
so  happened  that,  several  years  before,  I  had  bought  some 
lots  adjoining  ours,  on  which  were  some  splendid  locust- 
trees  and  a  few  hollyhocks.  The  soil  was  rich  and  the 
hollyhocks  multiplied  until  there  was  about  a  quarter  of 
an  acre  of  them  of  all  colors — red,  pink,  blue,  and  white — 
constituting  a  magnificent  flower-garden  on  the  wedding- 
day.  In  the  corner  of  that  sea  of  color,  under  two  great 
locust-trees,  on  a  raised  platform,  the  ceremony  took 
place.  Mrs.  Clark  stood  the  ordeal  very  well,  but  I 
broke  down  and  cried  like  a  baby. 

If  our  friends  had  not  made  a  neighborhood  aflFair  of 
it  I  don't  see  how  we  could  have  pulled  through.  They 
were  exceedingly  kind,  among  other  things  bringing  in 
five  hundred  cakes — some  of  them  big  as  a  dishpan.  The 
number  of  wedding-presents  was  simply  amazing. 

LITTLE   CHAMP  THE  THIRD 

On  Tuesday,  February  13,  1917,  upon  motion  of  Repre- 
sentative Rausch,  of  Indiana,  the  House  had  resolved 
itself  into  the  Committee  of  the  Whole  House  for  the  con- 
sideration of  the  Pension  Appropriation  bill.  I  had 
given  the  gavel  to  Representative  William  Ezra  Williams 
and  had  retired  from  the  hall  of  the  House,  with  Mr. 
Williams  presiding  there  as  chairman  of  the  Committee 
of  the  Whole. 

Later  in  the  afternoon  I  was  notified  that  the  Pension 
Appropriation  bill  was  ready  for  submission  to  the  House, 
and  I  returned  to  assume  the  gavel,  as  law  and  parlia- 
mentary procedure  require.  But  before  I  entered  the 
hall,  and  before  the  committee  had  arisen  to  make  its 
report  to  the  House,  my  splendid  personal  friend  and 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  39 

dangerous  political  antagonist,  Representative  James  R. 
Mann,  the  duly  accredited  leader  of  the  Republican 
minority,  made  the  following  remarks: 

**Mr.  Chairman,  before  the  gentleman  from  Indiana, 
Mr.  Rausch,  moves  that  the  committee  rise,  I  desire  to 
announce  that  I  have  just  been  informed  that  the  Speaker 
is  a  granddaddy." 

That  announcement  was  followed  by  hearty  applause, 
which  I  heard  as  I  approached  the  entrance  door. 

Immediately  following  Representative  Mann,  and  with 
characteristic  enthusiasm,  there  arose  another  dangerous 
fighting  Republican,  whom  I  am  proud  to  record  as  one 
of  my  very  warm  personal  friends,  former  Speaker  Joseph 
G.  Cannon,  a  man  past  eighty-three  years  of  age,  who,  in 
his  declining  years,  has  been  affectionately  regarded  by 
all,  and  of  whom  everybody  nowadays  speaks  of  as  "Uncle 
Joe."     He  said: 

"Mr.  Chairman,  if  I  may  be  allowed  a  moment,  as  a 
granddaddy  of  twenty-one  years'  standing,  I  take  great 
pleasure  in  welcoming  the  Speaker  to  the  camp  of  grand- 
fathers— as  I  sometimes  call  them,  *old  fool  grandfathers.' 
I  know  that  he  is  qualified.  He  is  the  recipient  of  a  hat 
of  the  vintage  of  1852,  donated  by  the  gentleman  from 
Cahfornia  [Mr.  Kent]." 

This  brief  speech,  welcoming  me  to  that  exclusive  and 
world-wide  aristocratic  class,  and  by  a  past-master,  was 
greeted  with  another  round  of  applause. 

When  I  entered  the  hall  of  the  House  and  proceeded 
up  the  steps  to  take  the  gavel  and  resume  my  duties  as 
Speaker,  there  was  a  tremendous  outburst  of  hand- 
clapping  and  cheers  from  all  the  members  present  on  the 
floor,  and  from  every  one  in  the  crowded  galleries.  The 
manifestation  was  so  kindly,  so  fraternal,  so  family-like, 
that  I  was  greatly  affected,  but  managed  to  utter  the  fol- 
lowing words  of  appreciation: 

"Gentlemen  of  the  House:  *One  touch  of  nature  makes 


40       MY    QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

the  whole  world  kin/  The  happiest  moments  of  my  life 
have  been,  the  day  when  I  was  married,  the  days  when 
my  children  were  born,  and  the  day  that  this,  my  first 
grandchild,  was  born.     [Outbursts  of  applause.] 

**The  other  *  happiest  day'  in  my  life  was  when,  as  a 
student  in  the  Kentucky  University,  at  the  end  of  the 
first  examination  in  Greek,  four  of  us  made  the  grade  of 
one  hundred,  on  a  scale  of  lOO.  That  was  the  first  vic- 
tory I  ever  won  among  strangers.  It  was  a  very  happy 
occasion. 

"From  the  very  bottom  of  my  heart  I  thank  this  House 
for  this  last  evidence  of  its  love  and  affection  for  me  and 
mine." 

ANOTHER   SURPRISE   PARTY 

Four  days  later,  on  Saturday,  February  17,  1917,  I 
was  surprised,  and  more  greatly  gratified  than  language 
can  express.  My  friends  in  the  House  had  quietly  pre- 
pared a  birthday  present  for  the  new-born  babe,  and 
Representative  Mann  told  the  story  in  the  House  of 
Representatives,  thus: 

"Mr.  Chairman,  in  a  sort  of  way  this  House  is  itself  a 
grandfather.  When  Genevieve  Clark  Thomson  was  mar- 
ried, the  members  of  the  House  presented  her  with  a  very 
beautiful  wedding-present. 

"  She  is  now  the  mother  of  a  son.  Champ  Clark  Thomson. 

"I  think  that  it  would  be  very  appropriate,  under  the 
circumstances,  for  the  members  of  the  House  to  give  to 
this  grandson  of  the  Speaker  of  the  House  a  little  present, 
in  the  form  of  a  cup,  knife,  fork,  and  spoon. 

"This  morning  I  had  Mr.  Shaw  bring  up  to  the  Capitol, 
(having  received  them  by  directions  from  New  York) 
these  implements,  in  gold,  and  the  gentleman  from  Mis- 
souri, Mr.  Lloyd,  and  myself,  constituting  ourselves  a 
committee,  went  and  examined  the  articles." 

(And  then,  as  though  it  had  not  been  all  previously 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  41 

arranged  and  understood  unofficially  among  themselves, 
Mr.  Mann  continued): 

**If  there  be  no  objection  from  the  members  of  the 
House,  we  will  ask  the  members  to  contribute  a  dollar 
apiece;  this  is  in  order  that  we  may  make  this  present 
with  an  appropriate  inscription." 

(Here  there  was  another  outburst  of  approval  and  very 
hearty  applause,  and  Mr.  Mann  added): 

"If  there  be  no  objection,  we  will  ask  some  of  the 
employees  of  the  House  to  go  around  to  the  members  and 
collect  the  money.  The  articles  will  be  displayed  before 
they  are  sent  away.'* 

It  must  be  understood  that,  under  the  rules  of  the  House, 
this  procedure  was  "out  of  order,"  and  there  was  no  prece- 
dent. Therefore,  Representative  Mann  was  proceeding  in 
a  parliamentary  manner,  by  saying,  "if  there  be  no  objec- 
tion," because,  if  there  had  been  one  member  so  inclined 
to  have  uttered  the  words  "I  object,"  this  honor  to  the 
Speaker  and  to  his  first  grandchild  could  not  have  been  paid. 

One  of  my  long-time  friends,  a  newspaper  man  who  is 
an  habitual  reader  at  the  Library  of  Congress,  has  called 
my  attention  to  the  fact  that  not  only  is  the  name  of  my 
grandson  printed  in  the  Official  Record,  but  that  it  appears 
in  the  index  of  the  permanent  Record  of  the  Sixty-fourth 
Congress. 

"words  fitly  spoken" 

Beginning  with  my  graduation  from  Bethany  College, 
West  Virginia,  in  1873,  there  have  been  several  thousand 
articles  pubHshed,  in  whole  or  in  part,  about  me,  ranging 
all  the  way  from  grossest  flattery  to  vilest  slander.  But 
of  all  these  articles  one  of  the  kindliest,  tenderest,  and 
the  most  pleasing  is  the  following  article  written  by 
Thomas  V.  Bodine,  of  The  Paris  (Missouri)  Mercury: 

Whatever  may  happen  between  now  and  the  next  presidential  con- 
vention, or  whatever  may  follow  it,  Champ  Clark  can  abide  content. 


42       MY   QUARTER   CENTURY   OF 

Having  for  the  first  time  experienced  the  sensation  of  being  a  grand- 
father, he  has  known  and  felt  a  thrill,  such  as  elevation  to  power  and 
place,  however  exalted,  is  powerless  to  furnish.  He  has  felt  the  weight 
of  a  dignity  and  the  glow  that  come  with  an  honor  beyond  the  power 
of  prince  or  potentate  to  bestow,  and  we  know  will  wear  both  worthily. 

The  years  have  already  prepared  him  for  the  part,  and  the  fine  head 
with  its  crown  of  white  hair  speaks  a  coronation  finished  and  complete. 
According  to  those  who  know,  being  daddy  for  the  first  time  carries 
a  thrill  indescribable,  but  it  is  always  tempered  by  a  sense  of  responsi- 
bility that  comes  to  a  man  but  once  in  a  lifetime.  A  human  soul  is 
his  to  mold  and  direct,  and  out  of  the  past  arises  one  by  one  the 
ghosts  of  his  own  infirmities;  out  of  the  future  throng  a  multitude  of 
phantoms — hopes  and  fears  that  grip  him  and  temper  the  joy  that 
should  be  his. 

But  when  he  takes  his  child's  child  in  his  arms  for  the  first  time,  and 
feels  the  warmth  of  embryonic  life  pulsing  against  his  own,  the  response 
is  free  and  unfettered.  He  knows  the  years  are  powerless  to  hold  him; 
that  his  will  be  the  shifting  scene  out  and  beyond,  and  the  sense  of  a 
direct  responsibility  sloughs  away.  With  it  goes  forebodings  and  in 
their  place  come  mellowed  reflections  of  age,  tempered  and  tender, 
that  at  worst  nothing  is  quite  so  bad  as  it  seems. 

Baby  hands,  baby  arms,  and  baby  chatter  hold  him  in  thrall,  and 
he  submits.  And  in  a  new-found  joy  there  comes  to  him,  perhaps,  a 
fimal  sense  of  those  values  that  endure.  So  be  it  there  is  a  little  child 
to  take  him  by  the  hand  and  lead  him  down  the  twilight  ways;  so  be 
it  there  echoes  in  his  ears  from  dawn  to  dusk  the  music  of  a  child's 
laughter,  and  in  his  heart  he  hugs  the  image  of  one  who  loves  him,  not 
because  he  is  "Mr.  President,"  but  just  "Grandad,"  greater  than  any 
President  can  ever  hope  to  be;  what  matters  it  if  no  liveried  lackey 
stands  attendance?  Of  what  moment  are  the  hinged  knees  that  bend 
that  thrift  may  follow  fawning?  How  quickly  even  the  false  friend 
and  the  blow  in  the  dark  become  powerless  to  hurt,  and  how  quickly 
the  pomp  and  circumstance  of  place,  and  all  shallow  praise  and  empty 
adulation,  resolve  themselves  into  the  trifles  that  they  are. 

The  bond  between  an  old  man  and  his  child's  child  is  one  of  those 
mysterious  recompenses  that  steal  into  his  life  at  the  sunset  hour  and 
make  it  holy.  No  other  relation  in  life  is  more  beautiful  or  more 
satisfying.  It  is  all  the  more  so  because  it  seeks  out  high  and  low 
alike,  and  finds  its  way  into  hovel  and  palace,  speaking  that  universal 
kinship  in  blessedness  which  abides  beyond  power  and  politics,  and  is 
unfettered  of  place  or  circumstance. 

So  here's  love  to  you,  Mr.  Speaker,  and  in  Missouri  a  yet  finer 
sympathy.     You  sit  in  the  seat  of  the  mighty  through  no  man's  favor. 


AMERICAN   POLITICS  43 

and  none  can  rob  you  of  the  laurel  that  the  hands  of  a  little  child  will 
bind  about  your  brow.  No  President,  now  or  forever,  can  possibly 
be  as  great  a  man  as  grandad — but  this  is  not  saying  that  to  be  both 
isn't  worthy  of  any  man's  ambition. 

My  grandson  was  developing  both  mentally  and  phys- 
ically, according  to  our  fondest  hopes  and  deepest  affec- 
tions; but  November  l,  1919,  the  awful,  the  crushing 
news  came  that  our  bright,  handsome,  lovely  boy  was 
dead.  All  our  hopes,  all  our  plans,  all  our  dreams  of  a 
splendid  and  useful  career  for  him  were  shattered. 

My  friend,  Hon.  Frank  W.  Mondell,  Majority  floor 
leader,  announced  his  death  in  the  House,  in  words  full 
of  tenderest  sympathy.  The  House,  which  had  wel- 
comed the  news  of  his  birth  with  glad  acclaim,  sincerely 
mourned  his  departure. 

His  body  lay  in  state  in  the  parlors  of  the  Congress  Hall 
Hotel.  Everybody  was  kindness  itself.  The  lobby  and 
parlors  were  full  of  the  little  fellow's  friends. 

We  laid  him  to  rest  at  Charlestown,  West  Virginia,  in 
the  burial  lot  of  his  father's  family,  under  a  mountain  of 
flowers  contributed  by  his  friends  in  all  the  ranks  of  life, 
from  President  Wilson  to  the  bell-boys,  chambermaids, 
and  elevator-girls  in  the  hotel.  Universally  beloved  in 
life,  he  is  universally  beloved  in  his  grave. 


CHAPTER  III 

My  first  school-teachers — Brady  and  Whlttern — Morgan  and  Woolford — Ken- 
tucky soldiers  and  gentlemen — Generals  Morgan,  Beattie,  and  Brecken- 
ridge,  as  horsemen — "Two-story-and-a-half  head" — Coulter  and  Prather 
fatal  feud — Cowardly  murder  of  old  man  Coulter — ^Whittern's  sui  generis 
arithmetic  class — ^Wonderful  war  heroes — Saw  and  heard  piano  first  on 
Election  Day — First  law-book — Clerking  in  store  when  only  fourteen  years 
old — Debating  societies — Mule-races — Love  of  my  pupils — Colonel  Glenn. 

MY  first  teacher  was  a  medical  student,  afterward  Dr. 
John  A.  Brady.  That  he  was  above  the  average  as 
a  physician  and  surgeon — every  country  doctor  is  of  neces- 
sity somewhat  of  a  surgeon — is  attested  by  the  fact  that 
starting  in  the  Civil  War  as  a  regimental  surgeon  of 
Woolford's  celebrated  First  Kentucky  Union  Cavalry,  he 
was  promoted  first  to  brigade  surgeon  and  then  to  division 
surgeon.  It  was  said  of  that  regiment  that  enough  of  its 
members  could  not  be  gotten  together  for  a  dress  parade 
except  on  the  eve  of  battle,  when  they  forgathered  from 
all  points  of  the  compass  and  went  joyously  into  the  fight. 
Colonel  Woolford,  as  well  as  his  men,  paid  little  atten- 
tion to  military  rules  as  to  equipment.  The  colonel  him- 
self did  not  dress  in  the  uniform  of  his  rank,  but  in  that  of 
private,  and  generally  in  private's  uniform,  decidedly 
shabby.  He  was  more  careless  in  matters  of  dress  than 
Stonewall  Jackson.  His  men  were  equally  careless,  but 
when  trouble  was  afoot  they  were  on  hand,  eager  for  the 
fray.  Careless  as  they  were  as  to  their  uniforms,  they 
always  kept  their  "shooting-irons'*  in  prime  condition. 
Likewise  their  horses.  It  is  little  exaggeration  to  call 
them  centaurs. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  45^ 

Somewhere  in  Tennessee  an  inspector-general  from 
Michigan  looked  Woolford*s  regiment  over  and  berated 
him  severely  by  reason  of  the  unmilitary  appearance  of 
himself  and  men.  At  last  the  rough-and-ready  old  moun- 
taineer lost  his  patience  and  his  temper,  and  with  a  great 
oath  and  in  bad  grammar  he  yelled  in  the  inspector- 
generaFs  face:  "Me  and  my  men  are  not  much  on  primp- 
ing up  and  we  did  not  come  down  here  to  steal  niggers, 
but  you  draw  up  your  two  best  Michigan  regiments,  and 
if  we  don't  run  them  out  of  Tennessee  before  sundown  Fm 
a  Chinaman!"    That  proposed  contest  never  eventuated. 

It  is  said  that  Woolford's  favorite  orders  to  his  men 
were:  "Huddle  up!"  and  "Scatter  out!"  Not  classical, 
surely,  but  they  understood  and  obeyed  their  beloved 
colonel. 

Colonel  Woolford  and  Gen.  John  H.  Morgan,  the  heau 
sahreur  of  the  Confederates,  were  old  friends,  having 
served  together  in  the  Mexican  War.  Their  commands 
were  frequently  pitted  against  each  other  in  fierce  encoun- 
ters, but  according  to  Gen.  Basil  W.  Duke,  Morgan's 
second  in  command,  they  formed  a  sort  of  affection  for 
each  other.  In  one  battle  Morgan  captured  Woolford 
and  begged  the  old  colonel  to  give  his  parole,  which  he 
positively  refused  to  do,  saying:  "My  boys  will  recapt- 
ure me  before  dark" — ^which  they  did. 

In  Morgan's  famous  raid  through  Indiana  and  Ohio, 
Colonel  Woolford  was  in  the  pursuing  army.  He  was 
present  when  General  Morgan  surrendered.  The  com- 
manding general,  also  a  Kentuckian,  began  to  denounce 
Morgan  bitterly,  whereupon  Colonel  Woolford  said  to  his 
superior  officer:  "General,  General  Morgan  is  a  prisoner 
of  war,  an  officer,  and  a  gentleman,  and  must  be  treated 
as  such."  Morgan,  who  was  a  great  dandy  as  well  as  a 
skilful  fighter,  stooped  down,  pulled  off  a  pair  of  gold- 
mounted  silver  spurs  which  the  admiring  ladies  of  Lex- 
ington, Kentucky,  had  presented  him,  handed  them  grace- 


46       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

fully  to  Woolford,  and  with  a  bow  which  would  have  made 
Lord  Chesterfield  turn  green  with  envy,  said:  "Colonel,  I 
will  not  have  much  use  for  these  spurs  for  some  time  and 
I  present  them  to  you,  the  flower  of  Kentucky  chivalry!" 
Most  assuredly  the  Kentuckians  are  a  generous,  lion- 
hearted  race,  ready  to  fight  at  the  drop  of  a  hat  and  drop 
it  themselves. 

Colonel  Woolford,  as  brave  a  soldier  as  ever  rode  to 
battle,  as  true  a  patriot  as  ever  fought  for  our  flag,  was 
cashiered  and  dismissed  from  the  service  because  he  made 
speeches  denouncing  the  project  to  enlist  colored  men. 
He  oflFered  to  enlist  as  a  private  in  his  own  regiment,  but 
the  authorities  would  not  have  it.  Subsequently  he  rep- 
resented his  district  for  two  terms  in  Congress. 

When  I  was  six  years  old  I  began  my  educational 
training  under  his  regimental  surgeon,  and  when  I  was 
nineteen  I  studied  German  at  Transylvania  University 
under  another  of  his  ofiicers.  Major  Helvetii. 

In  1 910,  forty-eight  years  after  I  watched  the  seven 
homeguards  charge  Morgan's  cavalry  at  Mackville,  I  had 
a  queer  experience  about  General  Morgan,  growing  out 
of  my  penchant  for  talking  about  him  and  Woolford, 
Harlan,  Bramlett,  Rousseau,  and  others.  A  man  named 
Bland  was  the  Republican  nominee  for  Congress  in  the 
Vincennes  district  of  Indiana,  against  my  Democratic 
friend.  Judge  William  A.  Cullop.  One  night  I  spoke  at 
Vincennes  in  aid  of  CuUop's  candidacy.  Mrs.  Cullop 
told  me  that  Bland  argued  in  his  speeches  that  Cullop 
ought  not  to  be  elected  because  he  would  vote  for  me  for 
Speaker,  and  that  I  ought  not  to  be  elected  Speaker 
because  I  had  said  that  Gen.  John  H.  Morgan  was  a 
handsome  man.  It  was  a  thing  incredible  that  any  man 
should  make  such  an  argument,  and  I  could  not  refrain 
from  taking  a  shot  at  him  at  point-blank  range,  next  day, 
in  a  speech  in  his  home  town.  When  I  came  to  the  right 
place,  I  thus  ^iddressed  the  large  audience;  "Mr*  Bl^n4 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  47 

says  that  Judge  Cullop  ought  not  to  be  elected  because 
he  would  vote  for  me  for  Speaker  and  that  I  ought  not 
to  be  elected  to  that  position — the  second  highest  in  the 
gift  of  the  American  people — because  I  once  said  that 
the  dashing  Confederate  cavalry  leader,  Gen.  John  H. 
Morgan,  was  a  handsome  man!  I  plead  guilty  to  that 
crime,  if  crime  it  be.  Precisely  what  I  did  say  was  that 
General  Morgan  was  one  of  the  handsomest  men  that 
ever  straddled  a  horse,  and  I  told  the  truth.  I  will  not 
deny  the  truth  even  to  elect  Judge  Cullop  to  the  House 
and  myself  Speaker  thereof.  There  are  many  old  Union 
soldiers  here  to-day  and  I  submit  to  them  this  question: 
Was  it  necessary  for  a  man  to  be  ugly  as  a  mud  fence  or 
original  sin  in  order  to  qualify  as  a  Confederate  soldier.? 
I  will  tell  you  as  an  offset  to  Mr.  Bland's  preposterous 
argument,  a  beautiful  short  story  about  a  gallant  Union 
officer.  Gen.  John  Beattie,  of  Ohio.  Shortly  after  the 
Civil  War,  at  a  reunion  of  Union  soldiers,  one  of  them 
shook  hands  with  General  Beattie,  and  said,  with  much 
enthusiasm:  *  General,  you  are  the  handsomest  man  I 
ever  saw  on  a  horse!'  Whereupon  General  Beattie  re- 
plied: *You  certainly  never  saw  the  Confederate  Gen. 
John  C.  Breckenridge  on  a  horse!" — a  generous  and 
gracious  compliment  for  a  general  of  one  army  to  pay 
to  a  general  of  the  opposing  army!  Judge  ye  this  day 
betwixt  the  sense  and  taste  of  Mr.  Bland  and  General 
Beattie." 

The  Union  veterans  yelled  with  delight  and  Judge 
Cullop  was  triumphantly  elected.  I  do  not  believe  my 
speech  did  it,  but  I  am  confident  that  it  did  not  injure 
him. 

Apropos  of  General  Breckenridge's  personal  appear- 
ance, I  never  saw  him  on  horseback,  but  he  was  the 
handsomest  man,  the  most  majestic  human  being,  I  ever 
clapped  eyes  on.  I  saw  him  frequently  while  I  was 
attending  Transylvania  University,  at  Lexington,  and  was 


48       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

in  the  vast  concourse  who  Ustened  to  his  speech  on  his 
return  from  exile.  The  only  sentence  out  of  that  speech 
which  I  remember  was  when  he  exclaimed:  "Politically, 
I  am  an  extinct  volcano!'* 

When  I  was  a  small  boy  my  father  talked  a  great  deal 
about  Breckenridge.  One  day  I  asked  him  what  sort  of 
a  looking  man  Breckenridge  was.  He  replied:  "He  is  a 
large,  tall,  handsome  man,  with  a  two-story-and-a-half 
head!" — the  exact  and  literal  truth. 

The  General  Rousseau  who  camped  on  Call's  farm  the 
night  before  he  fought  at  Perryville  was  also  a  large, 
handsome  man,  and  after  the  war  represented  the  Louis- 
ville district  in  Congress.  In  a  fight  in  the  House  he 
broke  a  lignum-vitae  stick  over  the  head  of  a  fellow-mem- 
ber who  had  insulted  him,  and  resigned  to  keep  from  being 
expelled.  He  went  back  home  and  was  re-elected  by 
unanimous  vote,  his  constituents  not  permitting  anybody 
to  oppose  him.  After  he  was  re-elected  the  people  of 
Louisville,  at  a  great  mass-meeting,  presented  him  with 
a  tough  Kentucky  hickory  stick  with  a  gold  knob  on  it 
big  as  a  walnut. 

The  wiseacres  who  write  sensational  books  and  maga- 
zine articles  about  Kentucky  feuds  try  to  make  their 
readers  believe  that  feuds  are  confined  to  the  moun- 
taineers, which  is  a  fable.  Certainly  Washington  County 
is  not  mountainous.  It  is  composed  of  rich  creek  and 
river  bottoms  and  gently  rolling  blue-grass  hills,  though 
not  within  the  charmed  circle  of  the  far-famed  blue 
grass. 

At  Whittern's  School  in  the  old  Glen's  Creek  Meeting- 
house, I  had  for  schoolmates  gigantic  twin  brothers 
named  WiUiam  and  Harvey  Prather,'  together  with  their 
cousin,  Levi  Coulter,  cousin  also  to  "Big  Zay  Coulter," 
the  "Sue  Mundy  guerrilla"  hereinafter  mentioned.  All 
the  Coulters  were  Southern  sympathizers,  while  the 
Prathers  were  stanch  Unionists.     This  difference  of  view 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  49 

engendered  bitterness  of  feeling  betwixt  these  kindred 
families.  To  add  fuel  to  the  flames,  Levi  Coulter  and 
his  cousin,  Harve  Prather,  courted  the  same  girl.  She 
preferred  Prather.  They  were  married  in  harvest-time, 
1863.  As  was  then  the  custom  in  rural  Kentucky,  the 
wedding  was  about  noon,  followed  by  a  feast  that  Lucul- 
lus  would  have  envied.  For  some  reason,  Levi  Coulter 
attended  the  wedding  and  participated  in  the  wedding 
dinner — perhaps  to  show  that  he  harbored  no  malice,  and 
perhaps  for  the  purpose  of  revenge.  Whatever  may  have 
been  his  motive,  here's  what  happened:  after  dinner  the 
men  were  out  in  the  3^ard,  chatting  and  smoking,  when 
the  newly  made  bridegroom,  Harve  Prather,  and  his  rival 
cousin,  Levi  Coulter,  got  into  a  quarrel.  Coulter  was 
standing  with  his  back  to  a  plank  fence,  all  the  planks 
except  the  three  lower  ones  being  broken  off.  Prather, 
a  larger  and  stronger  man,  knocked  him  over  the  fence 
and  then  got  on  top  of  him  to  beat  him  up.  Coulter  got 
his  pistol  out  and  shot  Prather  through  the  heart,  killing 
him  instantly. 

The  Prathers  lived  on  a  gravel  road  about  two  miles 
from  Willisburg.  The  Coulters  lived  on  the  same  gravel 
road  about  half  a  mile  nearer  to  Willisburg,  the  house 
being  on  a  slightly  higher  ground  than  tl^  Prather  house. 
From  the  up-stairs  south  window  of  the  Coulter  house 
one  could  observe  what  was  going  on  on  the  Prather 
premises.  Levi  Coulter  knew  enough  about  his  Prather 
cousins  to  know  that  they  would  "get"  him  if  he  did  not 
"get*'  them  first.  So,  two  or  three  days  after  the  death 
of  Harvey,  Levi  was  at  that  up-stairs  south  window  watch- 
ing proceedings  at  the  Prather  place,  when  he  saw  Har- 
vey's twin  brother  WiUiam,  and  the  hired  hand,  mount 
their  horses  and,  each  with  a  double-barreled  shotgun 
across  the  pommel  of  his  saddle,  start  to  Willisburg.  So 
he  descended  from  his  lookout,  concealed  himself  in  a 
thicket  of  locust-bushes  within  twenty  feet  of  the  gravel 

Vol.  I.— 4 


50       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

road,  and  shot  into  his  cousin  Wilham  two  loads  of  buck- 
shot, which  caused  the  death  of  William. 

A  few  days  later  Levi  and  his  father,  old  Tom  Coulter, 
together  with  their  negroes,  were  engaged  in  cutting 
wheat.  They  had  laid  their  revolvers  and  shotguns  on 
convenient  near-by  stumps.  After  a  while  they  looked 
up  and  saw  several  well-armed  men  approaching.  Levi 
recognized  them  as  the  remnant  of  the  Prather  clan  and 
their  allies,  and,  having  no  doubt  as  to  what  they  would 
do  to  him,  ran  for  his  weapons,  swearing  that  he  would 
die  fighting;  but  his  father  persuaded  him  to  surrender, 
arguing  that  it  was  the  constable  with  a  fosse  comitatusy 
coming  not  to  kill  him,  but  only  to  arrest  him.  So  the 
father  and  son  surrendered,  and  soon  Levi  discovered  that 
his  worst  forebodings  were  about  to  come  true;  for, 
instead  of  taking  them  to  town  to  turn  them  over  to  the 
authorities,  the  Prather  crowd  made  them  get  up  behind 
two  men  on  horses  and  started  to  a  dense  thicket  not  far 
away.  Riding  through  the  thicket,  Levi  motioned  to 
his  father  to  jump  in  one  direction  while  he  jumped  in 
the  other  direction.  As  soon  as  the  Prathers  recovered 
from  their  surprise,  they  opened  a  fusillade  on  the  fugi- 
tives. Levi  escaped  unscratched  and  was  never  seen  in 
that  part  of  the  world  again,  and,  so  far  as  I  have  been 
able  to  learn,  has  never  been  heard  of.  His  father  was 
less  fortunate,  being  hit  in  the  fleshy  parts  of  his  body 
by  forty-four  bullets  and  buckshot.  He  "played  'pos- 
sum," and  the  Prathers  left  him  for  dead.  That  night 
his  family  and  friends  transported  him  to  Springfield,  the 
county-seat,  in  order  to  have  the  celebrated  surgeon, 
Dr.  Frank  Polin,  patch  him  up.  When,  to  their  utter  dis- 
gust and  unspeakable  anger,  the  Prathers  learned  he  was 
not  only  alive,  but  apt  to  get  well  of  his  numerous  wounds, 
they  rode  into  Springfield  at  night,  took  him  out  into  the 
woods,  tied  him  to  a  tree,  and  shot  hundreds  of  bullets 
into  him,  making  sure  that  time  that  he  was  as  dead  as 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  51 

the  men  who  lived  before  the  Flood.  No  arrests  were 
ever  made  and  that  was  the  end  of  the  feud. 

Of  Whittern's  arithmetic  class,  one  was  voted  a  gold 
medal  by  Congress  for  heroic  conduct  on  the  field,  one 
was  killed  fighting  valiantly  under  Quantrell,  one  was 
wounded  under  Banks  at  Mansfield,  the  Prather  twins 
were  killed  in  a  private  feud,  Levi  Coulter,  who  killed 
them,  became  a  fugitive  from  justice,  and  the  youngest 
member  became  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representatives. 
While  Whittern,  being  a  professional  phrenologist,  claimed 
that  he  could  tell  what  was  inside  his  pupils^  heads  by 
feeling  the  bumps  on  the  outside  of  their  heads,  luckily 
he  was  not  blessed  with  prophetic  powers,  and  could  not 
predict  their  futures.  Otherwise  there  would  have  been 
some  long  faces  in  his  little  school. 

The  best  school-teacher  who  ever  taught  me  was  a 
strolling  Enghsh  phrenologist  named  Charles  R.  Whit- 
tern, for  whose  memory  I  have  profound  aflFection.  My 
father  induced  him  to  teach  for  three  months  a  subscrip- 
tion school  in  the  neighborhood,  and,  finding  that  he  was 
a  splendid  teacher,  father  and  others  induced  him  to 
teach  in  that  vicinity  for  more  than  a  year.  In  fact,  he 
taught  until  he  died.  I  thought  then  that  he  knew  every- 
thing. I  know  now  that  he  did  not  know  very  much, 
but  what  he  did  know  he  could  teach  better  than  any 
other  man  that  I  ever  saw.  As  between  a  teacher  who 
knows  little  but  can  incite  in  his  pupils  a  love  of  learning 
and  one  who  knows  a  great  deal  and  has  not  the  power 
to  incite  that  love  of  learning,  I  prefer  the  former.  He 
is  by  far  the  more  valuable  of  the  two.  Whittern  built 
up  a  great  reputation  for  teaching  arithmetic,  and  a  lot 
of  grown  men  came  to  school.  I  was  a  little  tike,  only 
ten  years  old,  but  I  could  outfigure  any  of  them,  and  those 
bearded  men  made  a  great  pet  of  me.  To  show  the 
conditions  in  Kentucky  at  the  beginning  of  the  Civil 
War,  I  will  state  this  concerning  that  arithmetic  class, 


52       MY    QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

To  my  certain  knowledge  one  of  them,  Orville  Bush 
Young,  a  man  thirty  years  old,  studied  prayerfully  for 
two  or  three  months  to  decide  whether  it  was  his  duty 
to  go  to  Bacon  College,  Kentucky,  and  make  a  Christian 
preacher,  or  to  go  into  the  Union  Army.  He  at  last 
decided  in  favor  of  the  army  and  enlisted  in  the  Tenth 
Kentucky  Union  Infantry,  commanded  by  Col.  John 
Marshall  Harlan,  afterward  Mr.  Justice  Harlan  of  the 
Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States.  At  the  battle  of 
Jonesboro,  before  Atlanta,  Young  was  the  first  man  to 
place  the  Union  flag  on  the  Confederate  breastworks,  and 
Congress  voted  him  a  gold  medal  for  so  doing.  General 
Sherman  ofi^ered  him  a  captaincy,  which  he  declined. 
Another  man  in  that  arithmetic  class,  named  Nimrod 
Hendron,  served  in  the  Fourth  Kentucky  Infantry  and 
was  under  General  Banks  in  his  unfortunate  expedition 
up  the  Red  River,  in  Louisiana.  Hendron  was  wounded 
at  Mansfield,  where  Banks  was  badly  defeated  by  Gen. 
**  Dick"  Taylor,  son  of  President  Zachary  Taylor.  A  third 
member  of  that  arithmetic  class  was  named  Isaiah  Colter. 
There  were  so  many  Isaiah  Colters  in  that  vicinity  that 
they  called  him  "Big  Zay."  He  stood  six  feet  six  in  his 
stockings,  had  jet-black  hair,  was  about  the  complexion 
of  an  Indian,  and  was  straight  as  an  arrow — altogether 
one  of  the  finest  specimens  of  manhood  in  Kentucky — 
which  is  saying  a  great  deal.  He  was  one  of  the  chiefs  of 
what  was  known  as  the  **Sue  Mundy"  band  of  guerrillas. 
When  Quantrell,  of  Kansas-Missouri  celebrity,  received 
his  death-wound  at  the  battle  of  Bloomfield,  Kentucky, 
"Big  Zay"  was  shot  through  and  through  with  a  Spring- 
field-carbine ball.  He  made  one  of  his  friends  run  a  silk 
handkerchief  through  his  body  with  a  ramrod  and  tie 
knots  at  both  ends  of  the  wound.  Then  he  mounted  a 
magnificent  thoroughbred  stallion  belonging  to  the  cele- 
brated Alexander  stock-farm  in  Woodford  County,  and 
rode   twenty   miles    to  his    aunt's    house   in  Anderson 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  53 

County.  Shortly  afterward  he  contracted  pneumonia 
and  died. 

"Sue  Mundy's"  real  name  was  M.  Jerome  Clark,  son 
of  Gen.  Hector  M.  Clark  and  a  first  cousin  to  Beverly 
Leonidas  Clark,  a  Representative  in  Congress  and  Minis- 
ter to  Guatemala.  Jerome  Clark  served  three  years  in 
the  Confederate  Army  and  his  captain,  James  E.  Cantrell, 
of  Gen.  John  H.  Morgan's  cavalry,  subsequently  a  dis- 
tinguished jurist  and  father  of  Representative  James 
Campbell  Cantrell,  said  that  young  Clark  was  one  of  his 
bravest  and  most  trusted  scouts. 

The  accident  of  being  so  badly  wounded  at  the  battle 
of  Cynthiana,  during  Morgan's  last  raid  into  Kentucky, 
that  it  was  necessary  to  leave  him  behind,  together  with  the 
impossibility  of  joining  his  command,  changed  him  into 
a  guerrilla.  The  sobriquet  of  "Sue  Mundy"  was  "given 
to  him  in  fun  by  his  comrades  at  a  May  Day  festival  they 
were  holding  while  in  camp.  On  account  of  his  smooth, 
girlish-looking  face  and  long,  black,  wavy  hair,  which  he 
permitted  to  grow  down  on  his  shoulders,  they  crowned 
him  Queen  of  the  May  and  gave  him  the  name  of  'Sue 
Mundy,'  so  he  adopted  this  name  through  the  remainder 
of  his  life." 

He  enhsted  as  a  Confederate  soldier  at  Camp  Cheat- 
ham, in  Robertson  County,  Tennessee,  when  scarcely 
sixteen,  and  was  hanged  by  the  Federal  authorities  at 
Louisville  before  he  was  twenty-one. 

When  Young,  my  classmate  aforementioned,  enlisted, 
an  amusing  thing  happened.  A  man  named  Squire  Land, 
to  whose  sister-in-law  Young  was  engaged,  went  with 
Young  to  Lebanon  to  take  the  horses  back  home.  Land 
was  much  in  the  habit  of  violating  King  Solomon's  inhi- 
bition against  looking  too  long  on  the  wine  when  it  is  red 
in  the  cup — in  his  case  Kentucky  bourbon — and  upon 
reaching  Lebanon  proceeded  immediately  to  fill  up.  So 
when  Young  held  up  his  hand  to  be  sworn  in,  Land  held 


54       MY   QUARTER   CENTURY   OF 

up  his  also  and  was  sworn  in  "for  three  years  or  during 
the  war,"  as  the  witty  Irishman  said  when  he  wanted  the 
doctor  in  a  dry  community  to  give  him  some  whisky 
"unbeknownst"  to  himself. 

Next  morning,  when  Land  awoke  and  found  himself 
in  uniform  and  duly  enlisted,  he  said  that  it  was  all  right 
and  that  he  would  do  anything  a  soldier  was  ordered  to 
do  except  charge  breastworks,  which  he  swore  he  would 
not  do,  as  he  considered  it  an  idiotic  and  inhuman  per- 
formance. His  comrades  testify  that  he  was  a  brave 
soldier.  The  first  time  his  regiment  was  ordered  to 
charge  breastworks,  after  nearly  three  years'  service,  was 
at  Jonesboro,  where  Young  won  his  gold  medal  for  hero- 
ism. As  soon  as  the  order  to  charge  was  given.  Land, 
who  had  fought  on  many  bloody  fields  with  genuine 
courage,  true  to  his  word,  turned  and  ran  as  hard  as  he 
could  clatter  to  the  ambulances  in  the  rear! 

The  first  election  I  ever  attended  was  when  I  was 
fourteen  years  old  at  Mackville,  Kentucky — a  string 
town  with  two  or  three  hundred  inhabitants  in  1864.  I 
will  never  forget  what  I  saw  that  day,  should  I  rival  the 
age  of  Methuselah — for  among  other  things  I  saw  four 
men  shot. 

Early  in  the  morning  a  soldier,  Kyar  Voteau,  a  private 
in  the  Eleventh  Kentucky  Union  Cavalry,  drunk  as  a 
lord,  in  full  uniform,  and  a  BealFs  navy  pistol  in  hand, 
began  swaggering  around, "hunting  for  a  McClellan  man." 
The  civilians,  wanting  no  trouble  with  him,  gave  him 
hazy,  propitious  answers,  or  flatly  lied  out  of  a  scrape. 
He  proceeded  on  his  weaving  way  for  about  two  hours, 
getting  drunker  and  more  of  a  nuisance  and  menace  every 
moment.  Finally,  however,  he  ran  onto  a  snag.  He 
came  across  a  big,  strapping,  upstanding  private  named 
Sallee,  also  in  full  uniform,  who  belonged  to  Colonel 
Jacob's  Tenth  Kentucky  Union  Cavalry.  Voteau  an- 
nounced in  a  most  truculent  manner  that  he  had  long 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  55 

been  in  search  of  a  McClellan  man.  Sallee  said:  "You 
have  found  him!  I'm  a  McClellan  man!"  The  amazed 
Voteau  bawled:  "The  hell  you  are!  Where's  your  pis- 
tol?" Sallee  answered  very  quickly:  "I  have  none,  but 
you  wait  here  a  few  minutes  and  I  will  find  a  man  who 
has  one."  If  I  had  acted  with  wisdom  I  would  have 
departed  instanter;  but  as  it  was  my  first  observation  of 
election  proceedings,  I  proposed  to  see  all  there  was  to 
be  seen  and  backed  up  into  a  store  door  to  watch  develop- 
ments. They  came  with  such  a  rush  as  to  satisfy  even 
the  most  fastidious.  Soon  here  came  the  original  soldier, 
Sallee,  shaking  his  huge  fist  at  Voteau,  and  his  two  broth- 
ers, privates  in  the  same  regiment  to  which  he  belonged, 
in  full  uniform,  with  Beall's  navies  in  their  hands.  Not 
a  word  was  said.  Voteau  hopped  right  out  into  the 
middle  of  the  street  and  opened  fire  on  them,  and  they 
returned  the  fire.  He  wounded  two  of  them,  then  turned 
and  ran  for  a  hundred  yards  in  such  time  as  neither  Ten 
Broek  nor  Molly  McCarty  could  have  excelled. 

Exit  Kyar  Voteau.  I  went  down  the  street  three  or 
four  blocks,  where  a  stuttering  private  of  Rousseau's 
Louisville  Legion,  who  had  received  a  Minie  ball  in  his 
shin  and  was  home  on  furlough,  was  engaged  in  an  alter- 
cation with  a  citizen  named  Richardson.  Nicholson  went 
at  Richardson  with  a  bowie-knife  and  Richardson  shot 
at  him  with  the  last  "pepper-box"  pistol  I  ever  saw, 
all  six  barrels  going  ofF  at  once,  as  usual.  The  shots 
missed  Nicholson  and  hit  an  innocent  bystander  in 
the  leg. 

That  day  is  memorable  in  my  life  for  another  reason — 
because  then  I  first  saw  and  heard  a  piano.  It  was  in 
Squire  John  Bosley's  house  and  was  played  by  his  daugh- 
ter. Delighted  with  the  music,  I  peeped  through  the 
window  to  see  the  marvelous  instrument  and  the  beautiful 
manipulator  thereof.  Since  that  I  have  heard  "Blind 
Tom,"  Paderewski,  and  other  famous  performers  on  the 


56        MY    QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

pianoforte,  but,  so  far  as  my  memory  serves.  Miss  Bosley 
excelled  them  all. 

For  two  or  three  years  it  puzzled  me  why  Voteau  fought 
so  bravely  at  first  and  then  ran  like  a  race-horse.  At  last 
he  sent  his  children  to  school  to  me.  After  I  became  well 
enough  acquainted  with  him  to  swap  pistols  with  him, 
one  day  I  said:  **Kyar,  I  have  been  curious  to  know  why 
you  fought  those  Sallees  so  bravely  on  Election  Day,  1864, 
at  Mackville,  and  then  suddenly  turned  and  ran  away." 
He  replied:  **Those  cusses  shot  me  through  my  pistol- 
hand  and  shot  the  running  gear  off  my  pistol,  and  I 
wasn't  blamed  fool  enough  to  stand  there  and  be  killed, 
so  I  took  to  my  scrapers!" — a  complete  and  satisfactory 
explanation — proof  positive — of  the  truth  of  the  old  say- 
ing that  sometimes  discretion  is  the  better  part  of  valor. 
It  also  establishes  the  fact  that,  while  Kyar  Voteau  was 
somewhat  of  a  swaggering  bully  and  entirely  too  fond  of 
spiritus  frumenti,  he  was  a  good  deal  of  a  philosopher, 
firm  in  the  belief  that 

He  who  fights  and  runs  away 
May  live  to  fight  some  other  day — 

all  of  which  my  old  friend  did. 

A  few  months  later  I  attended  the  first  trial  in  court 
that  I  ever  witnessed. 

A  brilliant  young  chap  named  Tom  Peters,  scion  of  a 
large  and  influential  family,  was  a  soldier  in  Rousseau's 
Louisville  Legion.  A  Minie  ball  had  broken  his  shin  at 
Chickamauga  and  he  was  home  on  a  furlough.  At  that 
time  there  was  no  saloon  in  Mackville,  but  a  New  York 
druggist  named  Perkins  catered  to  the  thirsty  ones  on 
the  sly.  He  conducted  what  is  now  known  as  "a  blind 
tiger,"  "a  blind  pig,"  "a  joint,"  "a  dead-fall,"  or  "a 
speak-easy,"  owing  to  latitude  and  longitude.  So  on 
Christmas  Eve  Tom  Peters  and  a  lot  of  rollicking  young 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  57 

fellows  bought  some  bottles  of  Log  Cabin  Bitters — per- 
haps the  worst  whisky  on  earth — from  Perkins,  and 
drank  until  they  were  in  a  very  hilarious  mood.  Then 
they  demanded  more  bottles  of  bitters  from  Perkins, 
which  he  decHned  to  produce  for  fear  of  the  grand  jury, 
as  he  alleged.  That  did  not  satisfy  Tom,  so  with  a  bowie- 
knife  he  went  at  Perkins,  who  shot  Tom  through  the 
body  with  a  pistol. 

Perkins  was  duly  arrested  and  arraigned  before  Squire 
John  Bosley  for  preliminary  examination.  Perkins  em- 
ployed J.  Proctor  Knott,  the  famous  orator,  to  defend 
him,  and  Peters's  folks  employed  "Bob''  Hardin,  after- 
ward Chief  Justice  of  Kentucky,  to  assist  the  county 
attorney,  who  was  a  great  numskull,  in  the  prosecution. 
There,  in  that  little  dingy  office  of  a  justice  of  the  peace, 
those  two  distinguished  lawyers  wrestled  with  each  other 
for  two  or  three  days. 

I  played  hooky  from  school  to  watch  that  trial,  for, 
though  only  thirteen  years  old,  I  had  determined  to  be 
a  lawyer,  and  most  assuredly  I  received  my  first  lesson 
in  the  law  from  past-masters  in  the  profession. 

The  first  law-book  I  ever  saw  was  in  the  hands  of  J. 
Proctor  Knott.    It  was  a  volume  of  Ben  Monroe's  reports. 

I  shall  never  forget  the  evidence  of  Dr.  Frank  Polin,  a 
famous  surgeon  of  Springfield.  He  was  called  as  a  wit- 
ness to  testify  as  to  the  nature  of  Tom's  wound,  whether 
he  would  die  ot  it,  etc.,  in  order  to  fix  the  amount  of  bail. 
In  answer  to  a  question  of  counsel,  Polin  answered :  **  He 
will  get  well,  apparently,  will  become  fat  as  a  butter-ball, 
and  will  die  in  less  than  three  years  from  that  bullet 
wound,  turning  green  as  grass  before  he  dies,  because  he 
was  shot  through  the  liver!"  That  was  my  first  infor- 
mation touching  the  fact  that  a  man  had  a  liver.  I  was 
not  well  up  in  anatomy.  So  I  watched  Tom  Peters  like 
a  hawk  watches  a  chicken  to  see  if  Dr.  Frank  Polin  was 
correct  in  his  prognostication  and  diagnosis.    Tom  ap- 


58       MY    QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

parently  did  get  well;  he  became  fat  as  a  butter-ball; 
he  started  overland  to  California  with  a  drove  of  cattle 
and  died  in  the  Rocky  Mountains  in  less  than  three 
years.  I  have  often  wondered  whether  he  turned  green 
before  he  died. 

Another  reason  why  I  observed  Tom  so  closely  was 
that  when  first  shot  by  Perkins  and  when  he  thought 
death  was  staring  him  in  the  face  he  joined  the  Church 
of  the  Disciples;  but  when  he  recovered  he  declined  to 
be  baptized,  on  the  principle  enunciated  in  the  old  couplet: 

When  the  devil  was  sick,  the  devil  a  monk  would  be; 
When  the  devil  was  well,  the  devil  a  monk  was  he. 

When  I  was  fourteen  years  old  I  clerked  for  three  or 
four  months  in  a  country  store  owned  principally  by  a 
preacher  in  the  Christian  Church,  William  T.  Corn,  a 
very  handsome  man,  without  very  much  education,  but 
a  splendid  preacher  and  with  the  saving  grace  of  humor. 
That  was  toward  the  end  of  the  war,  and  the  country 
was  greatly  infested  with  thieves  and  robbers.  One  time 
the  proprietors  of  the  store  went  away  and  left  me  alone. 
They  directed  me  to  hide  the  money  that  I  took  in.  It 
so  happened  that  we  had  a  good  run  of  trade  that  day 
and  I  carefully  wrapped  up  the  money,  all  paper,  and 
stowed  it  away  where  I  did  not  think  any  thief  could 
find  it.  When  they  returned,  I  went  with  some  pride 
to  get  the  money  to  show  to  them,  and,  very  much  to 
my  disgust,  I  discovered  that  not  thieves,  but  mice,  had 
found  the  money  and  had  bitten  it  into  pieces  so  small 
that  it  was  impossible  to  tell  the  denomination  of  a  single 
bill.  Corn  was  a  poor  man,  but  he  exercised  his  Christian 
charity  by  not  hauHng  me  over  the  coals.  Nevert;heless, 
that  incident  so  disgusted  me  that  my  career  as  a  mer- 
chant came  to  a  sudden  conclusion. 

I  began  teaching  school  before  I  was  fifteen,  in  the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  59 

neighborhood  where  I  was  reared  and  where  I  knew 
every  man,  woman,  and  child.  Of  course,  I  was  too 
young,  but  it  was  the  only  way  I  had  to  earn  money 
enough  to  go  to  college  on,  and,  while  I  had  a  rocky  road 
to  travel,  I  hung  on.  Breaking  up  schools  and  running 
out  the  teachers  was  not  uncommon  in  those  lawless  days, 
but  they  did  not  break  up  any  of  mine  and  they  did  not 
run  me  out.  My  chief  quahfication  as  a  teacher  was  my 
physical  size  and  strength,  which  stood  me  in  good  stead. 
The  period  of  my  first  four  or  five  schools  was  just  after 
the  close  of  the  Civil  War.  A  great  many  young  men 
came  to  school  to  me  who  had  seen  service  in  the  army 
and  who  were  therefore  much  older  than  I  was.  They 
had  enhsted  during  the  last  days  of  the  war  and  their 
education  was  somewhat  belated.  Indeed,  soldiers  from 
both  armies  came  to  school  to  me.  One  man  who  had 
served  four  years  in  Harlan's  Tenth  Kentucky  Union 
Infantry,  and  his  daughter,  were  both  pupils  of  mine  at 
the  same  time.  When  I  taught  school  at  Camden,  in 
Anderson  County,  Kentucky,  in  1871-72,  a  veteran 
teacher  sixty-four  years  old  came  to  school  to  me  to  learn 
to  read  Greek  so  that  he  could  read  the  New  Testament 
in  Greek,  as  he  had  made  up  his  mind  to  investigate 
certain  theological  points  in  his  own  way.  He  made  me 
a  proposition  that  if  I  would  teach  him  Greek  one  hour 
each  day  he  would  hear  lessons  for  me  three  hours  each 
day.  As  he  was  a  tiptop  teacher,  it  was  a  very  good 
arrangement  for  me  as  well  as  for  the  pupils  and  their 
parents.  The  papers  have  had  a  good  deal  to  say  about 
the  fact  that  a  certain  man  and  his  son  were  classmates 
at  the  University  of  Missouri  recently,  but  I  am  rather 
inclined  to  think  that  that  is  no  more  remarkable  than 
that  one  of  Harlan's  soldiers  and  his  daughter  came  to 
school  to  me  at  the  same  time,  and  that  a  man  sixty-four 
years  old  came  to  me  to  learn  Greek.  One  thing  is  cer- 
tain— if  I   had   known  as  little  Greek  in   1871-72  as  I 


6o       MY   QUARTER   CENTURY   OF 

know  now,  my  aged  pupil  would  not  have  learned  to 
read  the  Greek  Testament  very  soon.  I  have  wondered 
time  and  again  why  a  man  forgets  his  Greek  so  much 
sooner  than  he  forgets  his  Latin. 

I  once  asked  Dr.  WilHam  Everett,  while  he  was  a 
Member  of  Congress,  of  the  why  of  that  fact.  At  first 
he  denied  flatly  that  such  was  the  case;  but  when  I 
insisted  that  I  knew  by  experience  and  from  talking  with 
others  that  it  was  a  fact,  he  gave  this  amazing  reply: 
"Well,  perhaps  my  own  case  is  not  to  be  relied  on,  for 
my  father  [Edward  Everett]  put  me  to  sleep  when  I  was 
a  child  by  singing  songs  to  me  in  the  original  Greek!" 
No  wonder  he  never  forgot  his  Greek!  It  is  safe  to  say 
that  no  other  American  boy  ever  had  a  similar  experience 
with  an  American  father.  Greek  was  Doctor  Everett's 
"mother  tongue,"  or,  more  properly,  his  "father  tongue," 
if  I  may  be  permitted  to  coin  such  a  phrase,  and  I  see 
no  reason  why  I  cannot  do  so. 

While  teaching  country  schools  I  organized  debating 
societies  of  the  grown-up  boys  and  such  of  the  patrons 
as  I  could  induce  to  participate.  We  debated  such 
thrilling  and  important  questions  as: 

"There  is  more  pleasure  in  pursuit  than  in  possession." 
"Which  is  the  more  useful  animal,  the  horse  or  the 
cow?" 

"Which  was  the  greater  man,  Washington  or  Napo- 
leon?" 

"Which  is  mightier,  the  pen  or  the  sword?" 
"Which  is  the  more  useful,  water  or  fire?" 
"Is  there  financial  profit  in  being  educated?" 
Occasionally  we  tackled  the  really  important  problem, 
"Should  capital  punishment  be  abolished?"     That  ques- 
tion is  causing  much  debate  and  much  legislation  even 
now. 

It  was  dull,  crude  debating,  but  to  me,  perhaps  to 
others,  it  was  useful,  because  in  that  way  I  learned  to 


AMERICAN  TOLITICS  6i 

think  and  talk  at  the  same  time  on  my  feet.  I  am 
decidedly  in  favor  of  school  and  college  debating  societies. 

One  peculiar  feature  of  these  debates  was  that  the 
debaters  stipulated  that  I  should  not  use  biographical  or 
historical  information,  for  even  at  that  early  period  of 
my  life  I  had  read  all  the  histories  and  biographies  I 
could  lay  my  hands  on.  The  amusing  feature  of  the 
situation  was  that  if  I  did  not  agree  to  be  thus  circum- 
scribed I  was  excluded  from  participating  in  the  debate 
in  my  own  debating  society. 

That  reminds  me  of  a  thing  that  happened  in  the  olden 
time  in  Lincoln  County — one  of  the  finest  counties  in 
the  district  which  I  have  so  long  represented.  Almost 
every  one  knows  that  the  best  mules  in  the  world  are 
raised  in  Missouri,  Kentucky,  and  Tennessee.  It  is  said 
that  when  President  Wilson  sent  our  army  and  navy  to 
Vera  Cruz  to  awe  General  Huerta  into  saluting  our  flag, 
the  thing  which  most  surprised  the  Mexicans  was  the 
enormous  size  of  the  Missouri  mules  as  compared  with 
the  jack-rabbit-like  Mexican  mules.  In  the  early  days, 
one  of  the  favorite  sports  in  Lincoln  was  running  mule- 
races.  There  was  a  man  named  Bilbro  who  owned  a 
mule  which  was  so  fast  that  no  other  mule  had  a  ghost 
of  a  show  of  winning.  Bilbro's  mule  was  so  uniformly 
victor  that  other  mule-owners  declined  to  enter  into 
competition.  Consequently,  that  particular  and  primi- 
tive sport  was  dying  out.  Finally  an  ingenious  citizen 
hit  upon  this  happy  plan  of  reviving  it  by  publishing  a 
notice  which  ran  in  this  wise:  "Great  Mule-race!  All 
Mules  free  to  enter!!     Bilbro's  Mule  barred!!!*' 

There  has  been  much  over-praise  of  "the  good  old 
days,"  and  much  idiotic  condemnation  of  them,  but  some- 
times it  seems  to  me  that  the  pioneers  managed  to  extract 
about  as  much  pleasure  out  of  life  as  we  do  out  of  our 
up-to-date  surroundings.  At  any  rate,  they  were  not  kill- 
joys by  any  manner  of  means.     Perhaps  not  one  out  of 


62       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

fifty  who  reads  this  book  knows  that  a  pacing  or  fox- 
trotting mule  is  a  most  pleasant  saddler,  but  it  is  true, 
nevertheless.     I  know  it  because  I  have  ridden  them. 

I  have  one  abiding  consolation  in  looking  back  over 
my  career  as  a  teacher — all  my  pupils,  male  and  female, 
wherever  they  may  be  by  land  or  sea  and  whatever  their 
occupation,  are  my  sworn  friends  to  this  day  without 
regard  to  religion  or  politics.  Some  of  them  have  been 
of  great  assistance  to  me  in  politics.  For  example.  Col. 
Edward  A.  Glenn,  of  Louisiana,  Missouri,  has  been  chair- 
man of  the  Pike  County  Committee  and  the  Congressional 
Committee — managing  several  of  my  campaigns,  and  in 
the  presidential  campaign  of  191 2  was  one  of  my  most 
active  and  successful  managers.  He  possesses  a  positive 
genius  for  organization.  While  I  was  Speaker  I  appointed 
him  clerk  of  the  House.  Later  he  resigned  to  be  one  of 
the  Mississippi  River  Commissioners,  which  appointment 
he  obtained  with  my  assistance.  To  aid  him  in  securing 
a  good  place  was  to  me  a  labor  of  love — particularly  as 
he  is  thoroughly  qualified.  Colonel  Glenn  is  a  very  suc- 
cessful business  man — owns  and  works  three  or  four  of 
the  finest  farms  in  Missouri  and  IlHnois.  He  has  worked 
so  much  and  so  hard  for  me,  without  money  and  without 
price,  in  the  political  field  that  I  have  a  paternal  affec- 
tion for  him. 


CHAPTER  IV 

First  really  great  man  I  ever  saw — Played  "hooky"  to  hear  political  speeches 
— Governor  Bramlett's  pince-nez  spectacles — My  "first  appearance  on  the 
stage" — Chaplain  shouted,  "Boys,  give  them  hell" — Civil  War  and  reign 
of  terror — I  heard  battle  of  Perryville  and  saw  battle  of  Mackville — 
General  Duke's  thrilling  escape — ^Two  great  steers,  "Buck"  and  "Darby" 
— Little  girl  witnessed  murder  of  grandmother — Triple  lynching  followed. 

THE  first  really  great  man  I  ever  saw  was  Col.  John 
Marshall  Harlan,  later  Mr.  Justice  Harlan  of  the 
Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States,  one  of  the  most 
eminent  of  all  the  justices  of  that  high  tribunal. 

In  1863,  when  in  the  flower  of  his  years  and  the  prime 
of  his  splendid  powers,  he  was  candidate  for  Attorney- 
General  of  Kentucky,  to  which  ofl&ce  he  was  elected. 
He  was  as  magnificent  a  specimen  of  a  physical  man  as 
one  would  have  found  in  a  month's  journey — standing 
six  feet  three  in  his  stockings,  weighing  two  hundred  avoir- 
dupois without  an  ounce  of  surplus  flesh,  red-headed, 
blond  as  any  lily,  graceful  as  a  panther,  he  was  the 
typical  Kentuckian  in  his  best  estate. 

His  mental  and  educational  equipment  was  superb. 
On  a  glorious  day  in  October,  at  a  great  picnic  in  Henry 
Isham's  sugar-grove,  in  the  outskirts  of  Mackville,  Colonel 
Harlan  and  Col.  Thomas  E.  Bramlett,  candidate  for 
Governor,  spoke  to  a  great  concourse  of  people.  I  played 
hooky  to  hear  them  speak.  Governor  Bramlett  was  a 
large,  handsome  man  and  made  a  good  speech,  but 
Harlan  easily  overtopped  him  mentally,  physically,  and 
oratorically.  Mere  chunk  of  a  boy  as  I  was,  I  could  see 
that  Harlan  was  the  greater  man,  and  I  thought  that 


64       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

therefore  he  ought  to  have  been  running  for  the  greater 
office — the  correct  theory,  surely.  That  night  I  poured 
out  my  thoughts  to  my  father,  whereupon  he  kindly 
gave  me  my  first  lesson  in  practical  politics,  explaining 
"the  availability"  of  men  and  other  things  unnecessary 
to  mention.  He  exploded  my  theory  of  the  biggest  man 
being  entitled  to  the  biggest  office,  but  I  mourn  for  that 
theory  yet.     I  regret  that  I  was  disillusioned. 

Colonel  Bramlett  had  a  large  Roman  nose  and  he 
carried  the  first  pair  of  pince-nez  spectacles  1  ever  saw. 
He  was  a  widower,  and  when  he  began  his  speech  he 
clapped  his  pince-nez  on  his  prominent  proboscis,  looked 
the  audience  over  with  a  quizzical  smile,  and  remarked: 
"I  hope  the  ladies  will  not  think  my  heart  is  as  old  as 
my  eyes  are!" — a  skilful  and  delicate  hint  which  pleased 
his  female  auditors  immensely,  and  which  is  all  that  I 
recollect  of  his  speech.  Had  female  suffrage  been  then 
in  vogue,  the  chances  are  that  his  delicate  mot  would 
have  made  him  votes. 

In  that  same  sugar-grove,  on  an  improvised  platform, 
in  September,  1863,  I  made  my  first  appearance  **in 
public  on  the  stage."  Call  told  me  I  could  go  to  the 
picnic  in  the  afternoon,  provided  1  would  cut  and  put  up 
eleven  shocks  of  corn,  sixteen  hills  square,  before  noon, 
which  was  a  good  day's  work  for  a  grown  man.  I  was 
only  thirteen,  but  I  accomplished  the  heavy  task.  I 
was  in  such  a  hurry  that  I  accidentally  chopped  a  piece 
of  bone  out  of  my  left  shin  with  a  corn-knife.  I  tied  a 
rag  saturated  with  Mexican  mustang  liniment  around 
my  wounded  leg  and  after  dinner  went  to  the  picnic. 
The  folks  set  me  up  on  the  platform  and  I  declaimed 
Webster's  glowing  peroration  in  the  Reply  to  Hayne. 
It  was  a  memorable  day  in  my  Hfe. 

One  company  of  Harlan's  regiment,  the  Tenth  Ken- 
tucky Union  Infantry,  was  raised  in  the  community  where 
I   lived.     I  knew  almost  every  man  in  it.     When  the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  65 

soldiers  came  home  from  the  war  they  had  divers  tales 
to  tell  of  their  beloved  colonel.  Among  other  things  they 
said  he  could  outrun,  outjump,  and  outwrestle  any  man 
in  the  regiment.  They  told  with  much  glee  how,  before 
they  were  ever  in  battle,  the  colonel  would  make  them 
speeches  about  how  bravely  they  should  perform  under 
fire,  and  how,  after  their  first  engagement — the  battle  of 
Mill  Springs — the  colonel  told  them  frankly  that  if  any 
of  them  felt  like  running  he  did  not  blame  them,  for  all 
that  prevented  him  from  fleeing  was  his  shoulder-straps. 

They  told  another  story  which  I  quoted  every  time  I 
caught  Mr.  Justice  Harlan  in  congenial  company  when 
anecdotes  were  in  order.  His  men  said  that  he  had  a 
very  bellicose  chaplain,  a  Baptist  preacher  of  local  re- 
nown. At  the  battle  of  Chickamauga,  so  they  claimed, 
when  the  Union  forces  were  hard  pressed,  the  chaplain, 
instead  of  being  in  the  rear,  administering  the  comforts 
of  religion  to  the  dying  and  aiding  the  wounded,  was  in 
front,  rushing  up  and  down  the  lines,  encouraging  the 
soldiers,  and,  believing  that  some  swearing  was  necessary, 
and  not  being  willing  to  swear  himself,  he  would  yell, 
"Boys,  give  them  hell,  as  Colonel  Harlan  says!" 

As  Mr.  Justice  Harlan  was  a  staid  and  rigid  old-school 
Presbyterian  elder,  that  excerpt  from  his  martial  history 
always  plagued  him  a  little,  but  it  tickled  his  friends. 

He  was  a  delightful  traveling  companion,  was  fond  of 
telling  anecdotes  and  reminiscences,  and  was  the  only 
man  I  ever  knew  who  habitually  bought  all  the  papers 
he  could  find  in  order  to  read  the  editorials  rather  than 
the  news. 

One  of  the  strangest  events  in  his  long  and  distinguished 
career  was  that  in  the  last  years  of  his  life  he  sat  side  by 
side  with  Mr.  Justice  Lurton,  an  ex-Confederate  Ten- 
nessee soldier,  on  the  bench  of  the  Supreme  Court.  These 
two  grave  and  reverend  seigniors  had  fought  face  to  face 
on  several  bloody  fields.     That  is  one  of  the  innumerable 

Vol.  I.— 5 


66       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

evidences  of  the  generosity  of  the  American  people.  Not 
only  was  Mr.  Justice  Lurton  a  Confederate  soldier,  but 
Mr.  Chief-Justice  White,  whom  all  men  delight  to  honor, 
fought  four  years  under  the  Stars  and  Bars.  Their  patri- 
otism is  no  more  questioned  than  is  that  of  Mr.  Justice 
Holmes,  who  fought  four  years  under  the  Stars  and 
Stripes  and  who  bears  honorable  scars  as  testimonials  to 
his  valor. 

Though  he  could  have  retired  on  full  pay  some  years 
before  he  died,  Mr.  Justice  Stephen  J.  Field  determined 
to  remain  on  the  bench  until  he  exceeded  Chief-Justice 
Marshall  in  length  of  service — ^which  he  did.  When  Mr. 
Justice  Harlan  could  have  retired  on  full  pay  he  started 
in  to  beat  Field's  record  for  length  of  service,  but  he  failed 
to  do  so,  death  claiming  him  while  he  was  still  strong  and 
apparently  good  for  several  years  of  lusty  life. 

He  was  the  first  man  whom  I  ever  voted  against  for 
Governor.  It  was  when  he  was  defeated  by  Preston  H. 
Leslie  in  1871.  Leslie  was  not  only  elected  Governor  of 
Kentucky,  but  was  subsequently  appointed  Governor  of 
the  Territory  of  Montana.  It  is  a  most  unusual  thing 
for  a  man  to  be  chief  magistrate  of  two  magnificent 
commonwealths. 

While  the  Union  and  Confederate  Kentuckians  fought 
each  other  with  conspicuous  gallantry  in  the  field,  they 
did  each  other  many  kindnesses  when  not  engaged  in 
battle.  Gen.  Basil  W.  Duke,  second  in  command  in  Gen. 
John  H.  Morgan's  Confederate  cavalry,  in  his  intensely 
interesting  Book  of  Reminiscences  gives  a  very  pleas- 
ant account  of  how  Col.  John  M.  Harlan  saved  his  life 
and  the  life  of  a  friend.  Captain  Kennett.  They  were 
both  in  the  Confederate  service  in  Missouri  during  the 
early  months  of  the  war.  As  their  wives  were  in  Lexing- 
ton, Kentucky,  they  desired  to  reach  that  city.  So, 
dressed  in  citizens'  clothes,  they  had  proceeded  as  far  as 
Elizabethtown,  when  a  brigade  of  Union  soldiers  suddenly 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  (>^ 

appeared  on  the  scene.    They  started  on  foot  toward 
Lexington.     General  Duke  says: 

"We  then  concluded  that  we  would  walk  along  the 
railroad  track  until  we  reached  some  point  where  we 
might  catch  a  train.  Quite  a  number  of  the  troops  were 
bivouacked  on  both  sides  of  the  road,  and  we  were  com- 
pelled to  pass  through  them.  I  cautioned  Kennett  not 
to  call  me  by  name  or  do  anything  which  might  especially 
attract  attention.  I  had  learned  that  there  were  several 
Kentucky  regiments  in  this  force — many  of  them  men 
from  central  Kentucky,  where  I  was  born — and  among 
these  it  was  extremely  probable  that  there  would  be  some 
who  knew  me.  We  got  through  safely,  and,  although 
occasionally  *  guyed,'  no  one  halted  us.  I  believed  that 
the  danger  was  past,  but  reckoned  a  little  too  hastily. 
Just  as  we  drew  near  the  entrance  to  the  tunnel  at  Mul- 
draugh's  Hill,  two  miles  north  of  Elizabethtown,  a  hand- 
car with  several  Federal  officers  on  it  overtook  us.  We 
stepped  aside  to  let  it  pass,  and  I  pulled  my  hat-brim 
over  my  face  to  avoid  possible  recognition.  But  Kennett, 
moved  by  an  impulse  of  pure  mischief,  called  out:  'Won't 
you  let  us  ride  with  you,  gentlemen?  We  are  very  foot- 
sore and  tired.'  I  forgot  my  caution,  threw  back  my 
hat,  and  looked  up  just  as  the  car  came  alongside,  and 
realized  that  I  was  face  to  face  with  three  or  four  men 
with  whom  I  was  well,  and  had  previously  been  quite 
pleasantly,  acquainted.  Among  them  were  Col.  George 
Jouett,  afterward  killed  at  Perryville,  and  Colonel,  sub- 
sequently Gen.  John  M.  Harlan,  since  one  of  the  most 
distinguished  of  the  associate  justices  of  the  Supreme 
Court  of  the  United  States.  I  was  immediately  recog- 
nized, and  my  name  was  called  by  two  or  three  of  them, 
accompanied  with  expressions  of  surprise  at  my  presence 
in  that  locality.  They  also  imperatively  ordered  me  to 
surrender.  I  tried  to  seem  astonished  and  look  as  if  it 
was  a  case  of  mistaken  identity,  but  was  very  much 


68       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

puzzled  about  what  I  should  do.  Greatly  to  my  wonder 
and  relief,  however,  the  car,  instead  of  being  stopped, 
rolled  on  into  the  tunnel.  When  I  saw  this  I  hurriedly 
bade  Kennett  good-by,  sprang  up  the  side  of  the  cut, 
which  was  neither  steep  nor  very  high  at  the  point  where 
1  happened  to  be,  and  made  off  at  a  full  speed  through  a 
field  of  standing  corn.  By  the  time  that  the  hand-car 
with  its  occupants  had  returned  to  the  spot,  I  had  so 
rapidly  evacuated  that  I  was  beyond  immediate  pursuit. 

"It  was  not  until  after  the  close  of  the  war  that  I  learned 
how  and  by  whom  my  escape  had  been  aided.  I  related 
this  incident  to  a  gentleman  in  Lexington  and  noticed 
that  he  listened  with  some  amusement,  as  well  as  interest. 
When  I  had  finished  my  story  he  informed  me  that  he 
had  heard  it  before.  *John  Harlan  told  me  of  it,'  he 
said,  *  just  after  it  happened,  and  it  is  to  him  that  you  are 
indebted  for  your  good  fortune  in  getting  off  as  well  as 
you  did.'  When  Judge  Harlan  recognized  me  it  at  once 
occurred  to  him  that  I  was  trying  to  make  my  way  to 
Lexington  to  see  my  wife;  but  he  also  realized  that  if 
captured  I  would  be  in  great  peril  of  being  tried  and 
punished  as  a  spy.  I  was  dressed  in  citizen's  clothes 
and  within  the  Federal  lines  on  no  ostensible  military 
business.  Under  ordinary  circumstances  he  would  have 
taken  me  without  hesitation,  but  was  unwilling  that  I 
should  be  put  to  death  for  an  offense  of  which  he  believed 
me  innocent.  So  he  quietly  placed  his  foot  under  the 
brake,  and  the  efforts  of  his  companions  failed  to  stop 
the  car.  Judge  Harlan's  foot,  Uke  everything  in  his 
make-up,  mental,  moral,  and  physical,  was  constructed  on 
a  liberal,  indeed  a  grand  scale,  and  might  affect  the 
motion  of  a  passenger-coach,  not  to  mention  a  hand-car. 
It  was  an  exceedingly  generous  and  kindly  act,  and  I, 
of  course,  can  never  forget  how  deeply  I  am  indebted 
to  him." 

I  was  within  hearing  of  the  battle  of  Perryville — one 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  69 

of  the  bloodiest  of  the  war.  General  Buell  was  the  Union 
commander  and  General  Bragg  the  Confederate. 

The  night  before  the  battle,  Rousseau's  division  of 
McCook's  corps  of  BuelFs  army  camped  on  Call's  farm 
where  I  was  working,  eight  miles  from  Perryville.  Mrs. 
Call  and  her  colored  woman  cooked  all  night  for  the  sol- 
diers and  I  carried  water  for  them.  Next  morning  at 
break  of  day  I  heard  the  cannon's  opening  roar — first  one 
gun,  then  more  and  more,  and  finally  the  rattle  of  small 
arms.  About  sunrise  a  stafF-officer,  his  horse  foam- 
covered  and  panting  like  a  lizard,  dashed  up  to  General 
Rousseau's  headquarters  with  orders  from  General  Mc- 
Cook  directing  him  to  double-quick  his  men  toward 
Perryville  till  he  struck  the  Confederates. 

As  at  the  famous  ball  given  by  the  Duchess  of  Rich- 
mond to  Wellington  and  his  officers  on  the  eve  of  Water- 
loo: 

Then  and  there  was  hurrying  to  and  fro, 

And  there  was  mounting  in  hot  haste:  the  steed, 
The  mustering  squadron,  and  the  clattering  car 

Went  pouring  forward  with  impetuous  speed. 
And  swiftly  forming  in  the  ranks  of  war. 


Rousseau's  soldiers  left  so  suddenly  that  they  threw 
away  much  of  their  impedimenta.  After  they  quit  their 
camps  I  picked  up  several  brand-new  blouses  and  pairs 
of  trousers  which  had  never  been  worn,  and  one  new 
pair  of  sewed  shoes,  the  first  foot-gear  of  that  sort  I  ever 
wore.  I  was  only  twelve  years  old,  but  large  for  my  age, 
and  managed  to  wear  the  clothes.  Good  Mrs.  Call  in- 
sisted on  dyeing  them  with  the  juice  of  the  black  walnut 
and  cutting  off  the  brass  buttons  before  she  would  let  me 
wear  them,  fearing  that  otherwise  somebody  would 
shoot  me. 

The  soldiers  did  no  harm  to  Call's  property  except  that 


70       MY    QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

they  burned  some  of  his  rails  and  ate  up  all  the  fruit  on 
the  place,  including  walnuts  and  hickory  nuts. 

Call  had  a  pair  of  the  largest,  tallest,  and  most  rapid 
traveling  steers — Buck  and  Darby — ever  put  under  yoke. 
I  plowed  them  many  a  day  and  kept  up  with  a  good  horse- 
team.  The  day  after  the  battle  he  told  me  to  take  the 
oxen  and  wagon  and  haul  some  rails  down  on  the  gravel 
road  where  the  soldiers  had  burned  his  fence,  which  I 
proceeded  to  do.  Just  as  I  began  to  throw  off  the  load 
of  rails,  on  top  of  which  I  was  standing  beside  the  gravel 
road,  a  brass  band  came  along.  Buck  and  Darby  looked 
at  the  musicians  in  amazement,  bawled,  stuck  their 
tongues  out,  ran  like  mad  through  a  thick  beech  forest, 
scattered  me  and  the  rails  along  miscellaneously,  and 
smashed  that  wagon  into  kindling-wood.  Probably  no 
such  time  was  ever  made  before  or  since  by  any  two 
bovines,  not  even  by  Solon  Chase's  famous  campaign 
oxen.  If  there  had  been  a  world's  ring  for  race-steers  I 
would  have  entered  Buck  and  Darby,  confident  of  win- 
ning the  blue  ribbon.  Luckily,  after  describing  a  parab- 
ola through  space,  I  landed  in  a  mud-hole,  from  which 
a  straggHng  soldier  pulled  me  out  unhurt,  but,  like  David 
Copperfield,  according  to  Mr.  Dick,  very  much  in  need 
of  a  bath.  I  was  delighted  to  escape  from  that  hazardous 
wagon-ride  alive  and  with  a  whole  hide.  It  is  not  so 
famous  a  ride  as  Mazeppa's,  John  Gilpin's,  or  Paul  Re- 
vere's,  but  to  me  it  was  fully  as  dangerous  and  thrilling. 

One  amazing  fact  about  the  battle  of  Perry ville  was 
that,  while  at  a  distance  of  six  or  seven  miles,  I  could  hear 
it  from  beginning  to  end,  General  Buell  and  his  staff, 
who  were  not  half  so  far  away,  did  not  hear  it  until  it 
had  been  raging  five  or  six  hours.  Perhaps  the  topography 
of  the  country  and  the  direction  of  the  wind  were  the 
reasons.  Buell's  failure  to  hear  was  one  of  the  facts 
which  caused  him  to  be  relieved  of  his  command. 

The  reign  of  terror  which  prevailed  in  Kentucky  from 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  71 

1865  to  1868  was  precipitated  by  a  murder  which  occurred 
on  the  Perry ville  battle-field  just  at  the  close  of  the  war. 
Part  of  that  bloody  field  was  a  small  hilly  farm  owned  by 
old  widow  Bottom.  On  her  farm  was  a  big  limestone 
spring  which  ran  a  stream  several  inches  in  diameter. 
The  battle  was  fought  about  the  middle  of  October,  at 
the  end  of  a  drought  of  considerable  length  and  intensity. 
The  two  armies  fought  like  tigers  for  possession  of  that 
spring,  and  around  it  dead  men,  some  in  blue  and  some 
in  gray,  were  piled  up  in  great  windrows. 

In  1865  two  men  robbed  old  Mrs.  Bottom.  She 
claimed  to  recognize  them  as  two  of  her  neighbors  named 
Taylor.  There  were  so  many  Taylors  in  that  community 
that  some  of  them  were  nicknamed,  and  one  of  the 
accused  was  generally  called  **SpHtfoot"  Taylor,  by  rea- 
son of  a  bad  accidental  ax-wound  which  he  had  inflicted 
on  himself.  They  were  both  indicted  for  robbery.  A 
few  days  before  the  opening  of  the  court  at  which  they 
were  to  be  tried  the  two  Taylors  concluded  that,  as  she 
was  the  sole  witness  against  them,  the  surest  way  out  for 
them  was  to  murder  her,  which  they  proceeded  to  do. 
She  lived  alone  in  a  log  cabin  with  a  loose  board-loft,  so 
common  in  that  day  among  the  poorer  folks.  It  seemed 
easy,  but 

The  best  laid  schemes  o*  mice  and  men 
Gang  aft  a-gley. 

So  It  was  in  this  case.  It  so  happened  that  on  the  night 
of  the  murder  her  little  granddaughter,  some  eight  or 
nine  years  old,  was  visiting  her  and  was  sleeping  in  the 
loft.  She  was  awakened  by  the  noise,  and,  looking  down 
through  the  cracks  betwixt  the  boards,  saw  tbem  murder 
her  grandmother,  and  recognized  them.  As  soon  as  they 
left,  she  ran  home  and  related  the  horrible  story.  A  hue 
and  cry  were  immediately  raised.  The  whole  country- 
side was  aroused  and  the  Taylors  were  soon  caught  and 


72       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

identified  by  the  little  girl.  They  were  placed  in  the 
calaboose  at  Perryville  to  await  their  preliminary  trial 
before  a  justice  of  the  peace.  Before  the  preliminary 
trial  could  be  had,  the  neighbors  counseled  together,  and 
the  best  citizens  of  that  community,  without  regard  to 
religious  or  poHtical  affiliations,  concluded  to  lynch  the 
murderers.  They  took  from  the  calaboose  the  two  Tay- 
lors and  a  colored  preacher,  awaiting  his  preliminary  trial 
for  being  too  free  with  his  neighbors'  porkers,  to  a  thick 
beech  woods  and  swung  all  three  of  them  to  the  limbs  of 
trees.  Now  be  it  remembered  by  those  not  acquainted 
with  beech-trees  that  they  make  a  shade  as  dense  almost 
as  that  of  a  cypress  swamp.  *'Splitfoot's"  rope  broke, 
and  in  the  darkness  he  made  his  escape.  He  will  reap- 
pear in  a  surprising  manner  in  this  story.  The  lynching 
of  these  men  was  the  spark  which  exploded  the  powder- 
magazine  and  which,  in  turn,  destroyed  the  lives  of  three 
or  four  scores  of  what  Colonel  Roosevelt  denominated 
''undesirable  citizens";  and,  by  the  way,  in  his  account 
of  his  life  in  Dakota,  he  looked  with  lenient  if  not  approv- 
ing eye  on  the  summary  process  of  lynch  law,  particu- 
larly where  the  crime  is  horse-steaUng  in  a  nascent  pioneer 
community. 

The  chief  reason  why  these  good  and  pious  people 
around  Perryville — and  there  were  and  are  none  better 
anywhere — took  the  law  into  their  own  hands  and  pulled 
off  the  lynching-bee  aforesaid  was  this:  Col.  Thomas  E. 
Bramlett,  a  Union  colonel,  was  Governor.  He  was  a 
brave,  generous,  big-hearted,  high-souled  man.  Ken- 
tucky is  perhaps  the  only  state  in  the  Union  whose  con- 
stitution authorizes  the  Governor  to  pardon  a  person 
accused  of  crime,  before  conviction;  but  in  that  well- 
beloved  commonwealth  the  Governor  can  pardon  a  person 
from  the  moment  of  accusation  till  the  sheriff  makes  his 
return  on  the  death-warrant. 

Governor  Bramlett  took  the  position — an  entirely  rea- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  73 

son  able  one — that  in  the  excitement  of  Civil  War  days 
many  citizens  transgressed  the  laws  who  would  not  have 
done  so  in  times  of  peace.  Consequently,  if  a  man  had 
been  in  the  army — either  army — for,  to  his  credit  be  it 
said,  he  treated  the  Confederates  as  well  as  he  treated  the 
Union  soldiers — he  would  pardon  him,  either  before  or 
after  conviction.  I  remember  that  about  a  year  after 
this  Perryville  episode  six  men  were  at  one  term  of  court 
sent  to  the  penitentiary,  and  that  all  six,  having  been 
soldiers — some  in  one  army  and  some  in  t'other — he  par- 
doned the  whole  group,  and  they  all  got  home  ahead  of 
the  sheriff,  who  had  conveyed  them  to  state's  prison. 
That  night  the  enraged  citizens  lynched  five  of  them  and 
would  have  lynched  the  sixth  if  they  could  have  caught 
him. 

So  the  good  citizens  about  Perryville,  fearing  to  take 
chances,  worked  off  their  own  criminals  in  short  order 
and  sans  ceremonie.  The  lynching  idea  spread  like  wild- 
fire. 

It  was  not  long  until  companies  of  regulators,  vigilantes, 
or  lynchers,  were  operating  in  most  of  the  counties  in 
Kentucky.  At  a  low  estimate,  they  hanged  fifty  to  sev- 
enty-five men — ^most  of  whom  richly  deserved  it — cow- 
hided  two  or  three  hundred  more,  and  ordered  that  many 
out  of  the  state.  They  went  at  once  and  did  not  stand 
on  the  order  of  their  going. 

It  is  a  historic  fact  that  several  Representatives  in 
Congress  went  to  see  the  first  battle  of  Bull  Run.  One 
of  them  landed  in  Libby  Prison  and  was  never  again 
enthusiastic  about  witnessing  battles.  Among  these 
visiting  statesmen  was  Representative  John  A.  Logan, 
of  Illinois — subsequently  Major-Gen.  John  A.  Logan — 
"Black  Jack"  as  his  men  fondly  named  him.  He  had 
been  a  captain  in  the  Mexican  War,  and  when  the  Union 
Army  began  to  retreat  his  martial  spirit  rose  and,  grab- 
bing a  gun,  he  began  to  shoot.     A  demoralized  soldier. 


74       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

running  to  the  rear  as  fast  as  his  legs  could  carry  him, 
rushed  past  Logan,  who  bellowed  at  him:  "What  the 
devil  are  you  running  for?"  Without  slowing  up  in  his 
gait,  the  soldier  answered,  "Because  I  can't  flyl"  For 
the  same  reason  these  enforced  Kentucky  refugees  didn't 
go  any  faster.  They  went  horseback,  footback,  and  in 
wagons.  They  were  a  good  riddance  and  Kentucky 
knew  them  no  more. 

Without  exaggeration  or  bad  taste,  they  could  have 
appropriated  as  their  own  a  witty  couplet  originated  by 
the  convicts  of  Botany  Bay: 

True  patriots  all;    for  be  it  understood 

We  left  our  country  for  our  country's  good! 

So  many  men  were  lynched  in  Kentucky  in  two  or 
three  years  that  a  person  traveling  through  the  woods 
instinctively  would  pick  out  an  eligible  limb  on  which  to 
hang  somebody.     I  have  done  that  scores  of  times. 

For  a  long  time  I  had  some  twigs  from  a  black-jack 
sapling  on  which  four  of  my  acquaintances  were  hanged. 

What  was  the  effect  of  these  summary  proceedings? 
Criminals  were  so  thoroughly  cowed  that  a  person  could 
have  left  his  pocketbook  lying  in  the  middle  of  the  big 
road  and  nobody  would  have  picked  it  up,  while  thou- 
sands of  loafers  and  thieves  who  had  been  living  by  their 
wits  or  by  the  strong  arm  went  to  work. 

The  chief  danger  about  lynching  is  that  it  is  as  con- 
tagious as  the  smallpox  or  the  bubonic  plague.  Another 
trouble  is  that  three  or  four  men  can  hang  a  man  as  easily 
as  three  or  four  hundred  can  do  it.  While  the  first  lynch- 
ings,  as  in  the  Perryville  case,  were  done  by  whole  com- 
munities acting  in  concert  to  administer  rude  justice  on 
persons  clearly  guilty  of  abominable  crimes,  later  men  were 
hanged  on  doubtful  evidence  or  mere  suspicion,  and  still 
later  a  very  few  men  would  hang  a  man  for  private  revenge 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  75 

for  some  small  personal  injury.  The  exposure  of  a  gross 
case  of  that  kind  so  aroused  the  people,  who  were  growing 
weary  of  the  extra-judicial  executions,  that  they  arose  in 
their  might  and  put  an  end  to  the  whole  business. 

The  case  which  stopped  it  was  this:  A  wild,  rollicking 
young  fellow  named  Sam  Lambert,  tall,  slender,  hand- 
some, with  a  fine  shock  of  long,  black  curly  hair,  went 
to  the  village  of  Cornishville  one  night.  He  and  four 
denizens  of  that  town,  full  of  fighting  whisky,  engaged 
in  a  game  of  seven-up  for  high  stakes.  They  got  into  a 
combat  in  which  Lambert  was  killed  with  pistol  bullets. 
The  quartet,  in  a  vain  endeavor  to  prevent  suspicion 
falling  on  them,  threw  his  body  across  a  horse  and  took 
it  to  the  black-jack  aforesaid,  about  two  or  three  miles 
from  town,  and  hanged  it  in  due  form.  He  was  the 
fourth  and  last  man  to  swing  from  that  sapling.  One 
close  observer  in  the  crowd  which  went  out  to  view  the 
corpse  next  day  pointed  out  to  his  neighbors  the  sug- 
gestive fact  that  Lambert's  long,  black  curly  hair  was 
stiff  with  blood  and  standing  straight  up.  This  led  to 
an  investigation,  which  developed  the  fact  that  the  body 
had  been  riddled  with  bullets  and  that  he  was  dead 
before  he  was  hanged.  By  piecing  things  together,  a  case 
was  made  in  court  against  the  quartet  of  seven-up 
players  and  they  were  convicted  of  manslaughter — and 
thus  ended  the  reign  of  "Judge  Lynch"  in  Kentucky. 
The  regularly  constituted  courts  resumed  their  sway  and 
the  Governor  ceased  to  pardon  except  in  cases  clearly 
meritorious. 

About  two  years  before  the  Lambert  killing,  when 
lynching  was  in  flower,  I  was  teaching  school  some  two 
miles  from  the  sapling.  I  was  only  fifteen  years  old.  A 
wild,  harum-scarum  chap,  named  John  Gibson,  two  or 
three  years  older  than  I,  was  one  of  my  pupils.  He  was 
as  bright  as  a  new  silver  dollar  and  treated  me  well, 
learned  fast,  and  obeyed  all  the  rules;    but  sometimes 


76       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF, 

when  school  closed  for  the  day  he  would  go  home,  get  his 
supper,  strap  on  his  revolver,  mount  his  horse,  and  dis- 
turb the  peace  of  the  neighborhood.  I  cautioned  him 
more  than  once  that  the  lynchers  would  nab  him  if  he 
didn't  watch  out,  but  he  scouted  the  idea  of  such  a  thing 
happening.  When  I  returned  from  Kentucky  University 
in  the  summer  of  1868,  one  night  I  stayed  with  friends 
who  lived  about  a  quarter  of  a  mile  from  the  home  of  the 
Gibson  family.  Just  about  sunup  I  heard  heart-rending 
screams  issuing  from  the  Gibson  place,  jumped  on  a  bare- 
backed horse  hitched  at  the  gate,  and  galloped  over  to 
Gibson's  to  ascertain  the  trouble.  They  told  me  that 
John  and  his  uncle  Bill  had  been  hanged  by  the  lynchers 
on  the  black-jack  saphng  about  two  miles  distant — the 
same  black-jack  on  which  old  Nate  Lawson  had  been 
strung  up  a  year  previously,  and  on  which  Sam  Lambert's 
dead,  bullet-riddled  corpse  was  to  be  hanged  a  year  sub- 
sequently. I  went  over  there  as  hard  as  I  could  clatter. 
I  shall  never  forget  the  gruesome  scene.  There  was  not 
drop  enough  to  break  the  necks  of  Bill  and  John.  They 
had  choked  to  death.  Bill  was  lightly  built.  His  face 
was  so  much  distorted,  his  eyes  so  bulging  out,  that  1 
knew  at  a  glance  that  he  was  past  all  medical  help.  John 
was  heavily  set;  a  perfect  blond.  His  eyes  were  closed 
as  though  he  were  asleep,  and  the  tip  of  his  tongue  was 
protruding  about  a  quarter  of  an  inch  between  his  teeth. 
The  skin  on  his  neck,  next  to  the  rope,  was  marked  by  a 
deep-blue  line.  He  looked  so  natural  that  I  did  not 
believe  he  was  dead.  It  was  a  very  hot  morning  in 
August.  I  felt  his  hands  and  face,  which  were  warm,  as 
in  life.  I  cut  him  down,  removed  the  rope  from  his 
neck,  and  began  rubbing  him.  At  first  I  worked  alone. 
Neighbors  dropped  in  and  we  tried  for  half  an  hour  to 
restore  the  vital  spark,  without  success.  Next  day  I 
helped  bury  the  twain.  The  ground  for  some  distance 
about  the  sapling  gallows  showed  that  the  two  doomed 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  -j^ 

men  had  made  a  tremendous  fight  for  their  Hves,  for  the 
Gibsons,  whatever  their  fauhs,  were  brave  even  unto 
rashness. 

High  authority  in  all  Kentucky  matters  avers  to  this 
day  that  Governor  Bramlett's  liberal  policy  as  to  pardons, 
which  precipitated  the  riot  of  lynch  law,  was  wise,  not 
because  it  led  to  the  habit  of  lynching,  but  because  it 
prevented  innumerable  and  lasting  feuds  in  Kentucky 
growing  out  of  the  Civil  War. 

I  said  that  "SpHtfoot"  Taylor  would  appear  again,  and 
here  he  is. 

He  escaped  from  the  lynchers  by  the  accident  of  the 
rope  breaking  in  that  beech  woods  near  Perryville,  Ken- 
tucky, in  1865  or  1866,  and  fled  to  parts  unknown.  Some 
twenty  years  later  I  picked  up  The  St.  Louis  Republic  one 
morning,  and  in  it  was  a  column  interview  with  him.  He 
was  en  route  to  Kentucky  in  the  hands  of  the  sheriff  of 
Boyle  County.  He  had  been  arrested  while  working  in 
the  lead-mines  of  Joplin,  Missouri.  In  his  interview  he 
gave  an  account  of  his  wanderings.  He  said  that  he  first 
went  to  Galena,  Illinois,  and  worked  in  the  lead-mines; 
thence  to  Oregon,  where  he  worked  as  a  lumber-jack; 
thence  to  Hawaii,  where  he  worked  in  the  sugar-fields; 
thence  to  Australia,  where  he  herded  sheep.  Thence  to 
New  Zealand  he  went,  where  he  did  odd  jobs.  Then  he 
turned  his  face  toward  his  old  Kentucky  home,  feeling 
that  some  invisible  chain  was  drawing  him  to  "the  Dark 
and  Bloody  Ground,"  and,  strangest  of  all,  that  he  felt  a 
positive  sense  of  relief  when  the  sheriff  clapped  him  on 
the  shoulder  and  told  him  he  was  his  prisoner! 

Last  scene  of  all  for  "Splitfoot,"  so  far  as  concerns  us, 
was  as  follows:  The  white-headed  old  man  appeared  at 
the  bar  of  justice,  was  tried  for  murder,  and,  though 
defended  by  Col.  Phil  B.  Thompson,  Sr,,  one  of  the  ablest 
of  all  Kentucky  criminal  lawyers,  was  convicted  and  sent 
to   the   penitentiary   for   life,   where   he   died.     Colonel 


78       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

Thompson  wanted  to  appeal  the  case,  but  "SpUtfoot" 
would  not  permit  him  so  to  do,  having  a  lively  and  un- 
pleasant recollection  of  how  the  drawing  of  that  noose 
in  the  beech  woods  felt. 

Gen.  William  Tecumseh  Sherman  once  said,  "War  is 
hell!"  Those  who  lived  in  "the  border  states"  during 
the  Civil  War  and  who  are  old  enough  to  remember  the 
tragic  events  of  that  bloody  but  heroic  epoch  in  our 
annals  will  with  one  accord  indorse  his  idea,  if  not  his 
sulphurous  language. 

It  was  easy  to  be  a  Union  man  in  Massachusetts.  It 
was  hazardous  to  be  anything  else.  It  was  easy  to  be 
a  Confederate  in  South  Carolina.  It  was  not  safe  to  be 
anything  else.  But  in  Kentucky,  Missouri,  and  the  other 
border  states  it  was  perilous  to  be  the  one  thing  or  the 
other.  Indeed,  it  was  dangerous  to  be  neither  and  to  sit 
on  the  fence. 

I  was  a  child  when  Sumter  was  fired  on,  living  in  Wash- 
ington County,  Kentucky.  I  remember  an  old  fellow 
from  whom  the  Union  raiders  took  one  horse  and  the 
Confederate  raiders  another.  So  when  a  third  party  of 
soldiers  met  him  in  the  road  and  inquired  whether  he 
were  a  Union  man  or  a  Confederate,  being  dubious  as  to 
their  army  affiUations,  he  answered,  diplomatically,  "I  am 
neither  one  nor  the  other,  and  very  little  of  that,"  and 
thereby  lost  his  third  and  last  horse  to  Confederates  dis- 
guised in  blue  uniforms. 

The  Kentuckians  are  a  peculiar  people.  They  are  the 
most  hospitable,  the  most  emotional,  the  kindest-hearted 
under  the  sun,  but  they  are  born  warriors.  A  genuine 
son  of  "the  Dark  and  Bloody  Ground"  is  in  his  normal 
condition  only  when  fighting.  It  seems  to  me  that 
somebody  must  have  sowed  that  rich  land  with  dragons' 
teeth  in  the  early  days.  To  use  a  sentence  indigenous  to 
the  soil,  "A  Kentuckian  will  fight  at  the  drop  of  a  hat, 
^nd  drop  it  himself,"    So  the  war  was  his  golden  oppor- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  79 

tunity.  He  went  to  death  as  to  a  festival.  Nearly  every 
able-bodied  man  in  the  state — and  a  great  many  not 
able-bodied — not  only  of  military  age,  but  of  any  age, 
young  enough  or  old  enough  to  squeeze  in,  took  up  arms 
on  one  side  or  the  other,  and  sometimes  on  both. 

Neighbor  against  neighbor,  father  against  son,  brother 
against  brother,  slave  against  master,  and  frequently  wife 
against  husband,  the  fierce  contention  entered  even  into 
theology,  rent  congregations  in  twain,  severed  the  ties  of 
blood,  and  blotted  out  the  friendships  of  a  Hfetime. 

Men  who  were  born  and  reared  on  adjoining  farms, 
who  had  attended  the  same  schools,  played  the  same 
games,  courted  the  same  girls,  danced  in  the  same  sets, 
belonged  to  the  same  lodges,  and  worshiped  in  the  same 
churches,  suddenly  went  gunning  for  one  another  as 
remorselessly  as  red  Indians,  only  they  had  a  clearer 
vision  and  a  surer  aim.  From  the  mouth  of  the  Big 
Sandy  to  the  mouth  of  the  Tennessee  there  was  not  a 
square  mile  in  which  some  awful  act  of  violence  did  not 
take  place. 

Kentucky  has  always  been  celebrated  for  and  cursed 
by  its  bloody  feuds — feuds  which  cause  the  Italian  ven- 
detta to  appear  like  a  holiday  performance  in  comparison. 
Of  course  the  war  was  the  evening-up  time,  and  many  a 
man  became  a  violent  Unionist  because  the  ancient 
enemies  of  his  house  were  Southern  sympathizers,  and 
vice  versa.  Some  of  them  could  have  given  pointers  to 
Fra  Diavolo  himself. 

As  all  the  evil  passions  of  men  were  aroused,  and  all 
restraints  of  propriety  as  well  as  all  fear  of  law  were 
removed,  every  latent  tendency  toward  crime  was  warmed 
into  Hfe.  The  land  swarmed  with  cutthroats,  robbers, 
thieves,  firebugs,  and  malefactors  of  every  degree  and 
kind,  who  preyed  upon  the  old,  the  infirm,  the  helpless, 
and  committed  thousands  of  brutal  and  heinous  crimes 
in  the  name  of  the  Union  or  the  Southern  Confederacy. 


8o       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

Missouri,  prior  to  the  war,  was  more  a  Kentucky 
colony  than  anything  else,  with  the  Kentucky  character- 
istics, feuds  and  all,  reproduced  in  stronger  and  larger 
form  in  her  amazingly  fertile  soil.  So  all  that  goes  before 
applies  to  Missouri  as  well  as  to  Kentucky. 

From  the  first,  Missouri  has  been  the  stormy  petrel  of 
American  politics.  The  richest,  the  most  imperial  com- 
monwealth in  the  Union,  her  geographical  location  always 
placed  her  in  the  thick  of  the  fight.  She  was  a  slave 
peninsula  jutting  out  into  a  free-soil  sea. 

The  first  serious  trouble  on  the  slavery  question  came 
with  her  admission  into  the  Union,  and  the  second  over 
the  admission  of  California,  a  Missouri  colony.  Most 
people  date  hostilities  from  Sumter,  April,  1861.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  Missouri  and  Kansas  had  been  carrying 
on  a  civil  war  on  their  own  hook  for  five  or  six  years 
before  the  first  gun  was  fired  in  Charleston  Harbor. 

If  Sir  Walter  Scott  had  lived  in  that  day,  he  could  have 
found  enough  material  for  fifty  novels  descriptive  of 
border  warfare  in  the  forays  and  exploits  of  the  Mis- 
sourians  and  Kansans  before  the  first  soldier  was  legally 
mustered  into  the  service  of  either  army. 

Out  on  a  Kansas  prairie  stands  a  monument  to  old 
John  Brown,  reciting  the  fact,  among  other  things,  that 
he  commanded  "at  the  battle  of  Ossawatomie  on  the 
30th  day  of  August,  1856!" 

Whether  the  opposing  commander  has  a  monument  I 
do  not  know. 

I  witnessed  only  one  battle  during  the  Civil  War.  A 
line  in  Gen.  Basil  W.  Duke's  entertaining  book,  Morgan 
and  His  Men,  is  all  that  is  vouchsafed  to  it  in  the  litera- 
ture of  the  war;  but  surely  it  was  the  most  astounding 
martial  caper  ever  cut  since  war  was  thought  of,  and  it 
fully  illustrates  the  Kentuckian's  inherent  and  ineradi- 
cable love  of  fighting. 

I  saw  seven  homeguards  charge  the  whole  of  Morgan's 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  8i 

cavalry,  the  very  flower  of  Kentucky  chivalry.  I  was 
working  as  a  farm-hand  for  John  Call,  who  was  the  proud 
owner  of  several  fine  horses  of  the  famous  "copper-bot- 
tom" breed. 

Morgan  had,  perhaps,  as  good  an  eye  for  a  "saddler" 
as  was  ever  set  in  a  human  head,  and  during  those 
troublous  days  his  mind  was  sadly  mixed  on  the  meum 
and  tuum  when  it  came  to  equines — a  remark  applicable 
to  many  others  besides  Morgan,  on  both  sides  at  that. 

Call,  hearing  that  Morgan  was  coming,  and  knowing 
his  penchant  for  the  noblest  of  quadrupeds,  ordered  me 
to  mount  "in  hot  haste"  and  "take  the  horses  to  the 
woods." 

Just  as  I  had  climbed  upon  a  magnificent  chestnut 
sorrel,  fit  for  a  king's  charger,  and  was  rounding  up  the 
others,  I  looked  up,  and  in  the  level  rays  of  the  setting 
summer  sun  saw  Morgan's  cavalry  in  "all  the  pride, 
pomp,  and  circumstance  of  glorious  war"  riding  up  the 
broad  gravel  road  on  the  backbone  of  a  long,  high  ridge, 
half  a  mile  to  the  south.  Fascinated  by  the  glittering 
array,  boylike,  I  forgot  Call  and  the  peril  of  his  horses, 
and  watched  the  gay  cavalcade. 

Suddenly  I  saw  seven  horsemen  emerge  from  the  little 
village  of  Mackville  and  ride  furiously  down  the  turnpike 
to  within  easy  pistol-range  of  the  Confederates,  and  open 
fire.  I  could  hear  the  crack  of  the  revolvers  and  see  the 
flash  and  smoke,  and  when  Morgan's  advance-guard  fell 
back  on  the  main  body  I  observed  that  one  riderless  horse 
went  back  with  them  and  that  only  six  homeguards  rode 
back  to  Mackville  in  lieu  of  the  seven  who  had  ridden 
forth  to  battle. 

Morgan's  command  halted,  deployed  in  battle-line, 
and  rode  slowly  up  the  hill,  while  I  rode  a  great  deal 
faster  to  the  woods. 

The  homeguards  had  shot  one  man  out  of  his  saddle 
and  captured   him,   and   Morgan  had   captured   one  of 

Vol.  I.— 6 


82       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

them.  Next  morning  the  homeguards,  from  their  forest 
fastness,  sent  in  a  flag  of  truce  and  regularly  negotiated 
an  exchange  of  prisoners  according  to  the  rules  in  such 
cases. 

Of  course,  Morgan  would  have  paid  no  attention  to  the 
seven  men,  but  he  supposed  that  even  his  own  native 
Kentucky  never  nurtured  seven  daredevils  so  reckless 
as  to  do  a  thing  like  that  unless  they  had  an  army  back 
of  them. 

I  have  often  thought  of  that  matchless  deed  of  daring, 
and  can  say,  in  the  language  of  the  French  General  Can- 
robert,  who  witnessed  the  charge  of  the  Light  Brigade  at 
Balaklava:   "It  is  magnificent,  but  not  war." 

Years  afterward,  one  of  the  seven  was  sending  his 
children  to  school  to  me.  After  I  became  well  acquainted 
with  him,  one  day  I  said  to  him:  "Gibson,  1  have  always 
wanted  to  know  what  made  you  seven  fellows  charge 
Morgan."  "Oh,"  he  replied,  "we  were  all  full  of  fighting 
whisky" — an  explanation  which  explained  not  only  that 
fight,  but  thousands  more. 

If  that  splendid  feat  of  arms  had  been  performed  in 
New  England  by  New-Englanders,  the  world  could 
scarcely  contain  the  books  which  would  have  been  written 
about  it.  It  would  have  been  chronicled  in  history  and 
chanted  in  song  as  an  inexhaustible  theme. 

It  is  generally  assumed  by  the  wiseacres  who  write  the 
histories  that  in  the  border  states  the  old,  wealthy,  promi- 
nent slaveholding  families  all  adhered  to  the  Confederacy, 
and  that  only  the  poor,  the  obscure  natives,  and  the  immi- 
grants from  the  North  stood  by  the  old  flag.  This  is  a 
serious  mistake.  The  great  historic  dominant  family 
connections  divided,  thereby  making  confusion  worse 
confounded.  Prominent  people  wore  the  Confederate 
gray.     Others  just  as  prominent  wore  the  Union  blue. 

Dr.  Robert  J.  Breckinridge,  the  great  theologian,  with 
a  decided  and  incurable  bias  for  politics,  who  presided 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  83 

over  the  Union  national  convention  of  1864,  which  nom- 
inated Abraham  Lincoln  and  Andrew  Johnson,  was  a 
stanch  Union  man.  Two  of  his  sons  achieved  high 
rank  in  the  Confederate  armies  and  two  others  in  the 
Union  armies. 

His  illustrious  kinsman,  John  C.  Breckenridge,  resigned 
his  seat  in  the  United  States  Senate  to  become  a  lieuten- 
ant-general in  the  Southern  army,  while  James  S.  Jackson, 
Representative  from  the  Green  River  district,  resigned 
his  seat  in  the  House  to  become  a  brigadier  in  the  Union 
Army  and  died  a  hero's  death,  leading  his  division  on  the 
hard-fought  field  of  Perryville. 

Roger  Hanson,  the  eloquent,  became  a  Confederate 
general  and  fell  on  the  field  of  glory  at  Stone  River,  while 
his  brother  won  distinction  on  the  other  side  as  comman- 
der of  brigade. 

John  J.  Crittenden,  the  best  beloved  of  Kentucky 
statesmen,  unflinchingly  stood  by  the  Union,  while  one 
of  his  sons  wore  the  double  stars  of  a  Union  major-general, 
another  achieving  similar  rank  in  the  Confederate  Army. 

The  Henry  Clay  branch  of  the  great  Clay  family 
espoused  the  Confederate  cause,  while  the  Cassius  M. 
Clay  branch  fought  with  the  traditional  courage  of  their 
race  for  the  solidarity  of  the  Union. 

John  Marshall  Harlan,  late  Mr.  Justice  Harlan,  of  the 
Supreme  Court,  with  a  pedigree  running  back  to  the 
Cavaliers  of  Jamestown,  won  renown  on  many  a  bloody 
field,  fighting  under  ** Old  Pap"  Thomas,  "the  Rock  of 
Chickamauga.'' 

In  the  same  army  were  Lovell  H.  Rousseau,  the  ideal 
soldier  and  princely  gentleman,  and  Benjamin  H.  Bristow, 
who  missed  the  Presidency  only  by  a  scratch  and  through 
lack  of  organization  of  his  forces. 

I  had  two  schoolmates,  older  than  myself,  named 
Dickinson,  beardless  boys,  and  brothers,  one  of  whom 
enlisted  with  Morgan  as  a  private  and  the  other  in  th^ 


84       MY    QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

same  capacity  in  brave  old  Frank  Wolford's  famous 
First  Kentucky  Union  Cavalry.  The  strange  fortunes 
of  civil  war  brought  these  brothers  face  to  face  in  the 
great  Indiana-Ohio  raid — the  greatest  ride  ever  taken 
since  horses  were  first  broken  to  bit  and  rein — and  when 
Morgan  was  captured  the  Confederate  Dickinson  sur- 
rendered to  his  Union  brother. 

In  Missouri,  Thomas  Hart  Benton,  "the  great  Sena- 
tor," a  North-Carolinian  by  birth  and  a  Tennesseean  by 
training,  lost  his  curule  chair  in  1851  on  the  slavery 
question,  and  so  long  as  he  lived  his  vast  influence  was 
for  the  Union.  It  was  his  political  pupil,  Frank  P.  Blair, 
a  Kentuckian  and  a  slaveholder,  who  more  than  any 
other  man  helped  to  hold  Missouri  to  the  Union,  while 
his  cousin.  Gen.  Jo  Shelby,  was  the  heau  sabreur  of  the 
trans-Mississippi  Confederates. 

To  the  same  class  as  Blair  belonged  James  O.  Broad- 
head,  John  B.  Henderson,  Edward  Bates,  Hamilton  R. 
Gamble,  Willard  P.  Hall,  John  D.  Stevenson,  Thomas  C. 
Fletcher,  Thomas  T.  Crittenden,  Samuel  T.  Glover,  John 
F.  Phillips,  B.  Gratz  Brown,  John  D.  S.  Dry  den,  James 
S.  RolHns,  the  most  brilliant  orator  and  one  of  the  largest 
slave-owners  in  the  state,  together  with  a  large  minority, 
if  not  a  positive  majority,  of  the  leading  Unionists  of 
Missouri. 

So  far  as  I  know  only  one  Virginian  of  the  first  rank 
fought  for  the  Union — Gen.  George  H.  Thomas — but  he 
was  a  host  within  himself.  He  was  the  greatest  soldier 
on  the  Federal  side,  and  that  will  be  the  verdict  of 
posterity  after  the  sleight-of-hand  performers  have  done 
juggling  the  facts  of  history  for  political  eflPect. 

Indeed,  it  is  safe  to  say  that  had  none  of  the  aristocratic 
families — ^wrongfully  so  called — none  of  the  great  families, 
none  of  the  slaveholders,  stood  for  the  Union,  Kentucky, 
Missouri,  and  Maryland  would  have  seceded,  and  if  they 
had  gone  with  the  South  unanimously  the  Confederacy 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  85 

would  have  achieved  its  independence;  but  if  those 
states  had  been  sohdly  for  the  Union,  if  the  house  had 
not  been  hopelessly  divided  against  itself  in  all  that 
region,  the  war  would  not  have  lasted  half  so  long  and 
William  H.  Seward's  optimistic  prophecy  of  a  "ninety 
days'  picnic''  would  have  been  fulfilled. 

This  brings  me  to  the  central  idea  of  this  chapter,  the 
main  fact  of  which  I  never  think  without  anger  and 
resentment,  for  I  believe  that  justice  should  be  done, 
even  in  writing  history. 

Let  me  say  that,  population  considered,  Kentucky  and 
Missouri  sent  more  soldiers  to  the  Civil  War  than  any 
other  state  and  received  less  credit  for  it. 

They  were  splendid  soldiers,  too.  Theodore  Roosevelt 
said  that  by  actual  measurement  the  Kentucky  Union 
soldiers  were  the  finest  specimens  of  physical  manhood 
in  the  Federal  armies;  and  when  Jefferson  Davis,  himself 
a  renowned  soldier,  reviewed  the  army  at  Corinth,  he 
declared  Cockrell's  Missouri  brigade  to  be  the  most  mag- 
nificent soldiers  his  trained  military  eye  had  ever  gazed 
upon. 

Nevertheless,  it  is  difficult  to  induce  extreme  Southern- 
ers to  admit  that  the  Kentucky  and  Missouri  Confeder- 
ates were  good  Confederates,  though  the  Kentuckians 
and  Missourians  made  a  four  years'  war  possible.  It  is 
even  more  difficult  to  induce  extreme  Northerners,  whose 
skins  and  homes  and  property  were  all  safe  during  the 
war,  to  admit  that  the  Unionists  of  Kentucky  and  Mis- 
souri deserve  any  credit,  when  as  a  matter  of  fact  they 
prevented  secession  from  succeeding. 

If  Lovell  H.  Rousseau  had  never  recruited  his  Louis- 
ville Legion,  if  old  Frank  Wolford  and  Thomas  E.  Bram- 
lett  had  never  established  Camp  Dick  Robinson,  Ken- 
tucky would  have  seceded  and  the  Ohio  River  would  have 
been  an  impassable  barrier  to  the  invading  armies. 

If  Frank  Blair  had  never  captured  Camp  Jackson — 


86       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

for  it  was  Blair  who  conceived  and  carried  out  that  great 
strategic  movement,  and  not  Gen.  Nathaniel  Lyon,  of 
New  England,  as  the  Northern  war-books  say — Missouri 
would  have  joined  the  Confederacy  under  the  lead  of 
Gov.  Claiborne  F.  Jackson  and  Gen.  Sterling  Price,  the 
peerless  soldier,  and  with  her  vast  resources  to  command, 
Lee's  soldiers  would  not  have  been  starved  and  frozen 
into  a  surrender. 

If  the  government  built  monuments  to  soldiers  in  pro- 
portion to  what  they  really  accomplished  for  the  Union 
cause,  Frank  Blair's  would  tower  proudly  among  the 
loftiest.  Camp  Jackson  is  slurred  over  with  an  occasional 
paragraph  in  the  history-books,  but  it  was  the  turning- 
point  in  the  war  west  of  the  Mississippi,  and  it  was  the 
work  of  Frank  Blair,  the  Kentuckian,  the  Missourian, 
the  slave-owner,  the  patrician,  the  leonine  soldier,  the 
patriotic  statesman. 

Some  day  a  Tacitus,  a  Sismondi,  or  a  Macaulay  will 
write  a  truthful  history  of  our  Civil  War — one  of  the 
bloodiest  chapters  in  the  book  of  time — and  when  it  is 
written,  the  Kentucky  and  Missouri  heroes,  both  Union 
and  Confederate,  will  be  enrobed  in  immortal  glory. 

It  is  said  that  figures  do  not  lie.  To  the  Union  armies 
Missouri  contributed  109,111  soldiers;  Kentucky,  75,760; 
Maryland,  46,638;  Tennessee,  31,092,  and  West  Vir- 
ginia, 32,068 — making  a  grand  total  of  294,669. 

Now,  take  an  example.  Suppose  that  as  the  sun  was 
setting  on  the  gory  field  of  Shiloh,  where  Albert  Sidney 
Johnston  was  killed,  all  the  Kentuckians,  Missourians, 
and  Tennesseeans  had  been  suddenly  subtracted  from 
the  Union  Army  and  transferred  to  the  Confederate  side. 
Can  any  sane  man  doubt  what  would  have  happened? 
As  certain  as  Fate,  Ulysses  Simpson  Grant  and  the  rem- 
nants of  his  army  would  have  been  captured  or  driven 
into  the  Tennessee,  and  Beauregard  would  have  fattened 
his  famished  soldiers  on  the  fertile  prairies  of  Illinois  and 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  87 

Indiana.  All  the  Buells  and  Nelsons  in  Christendom 
could  not  have  saved  the  silent  soldier  had  it  not  been 
for  the  Kentuckians,  Missourians,  and  Tennesseeans  fight- 
ing for  their  country  there;  and  with  all  Grant's  bulldog 
tenacity,  the  history  of  Vicksburg,  Missionary  Ridge, 
Cold  Harbor,  the  Wilderness,  and  Appomattox  never 
would  have  been  written,  for  the  all-sufficient  reason  that 
there  would  not  have  been  any  to  write. 

Take  another  example.  Suppose  that  George  H. 
Thomas  had  gone  with  his  state,  as  all  his  brothers  in 
arms  from  Virginia  did,  and  that  when  Pickett  made  his 
spectacular  charge  at  Gettysburg,  Thomas  had  in  the 
nick  of  time  reinforced  him  with  the  294,669  veteran 
Kentuckians,  Missourians,  Marylanders,  West  Virgin- 
ians, and  Tennesseeans  then  fighting  in  the  Union  armies, 
can  any  human  being  fail  to  understand  what  would  have 
been  the  result?  Meade's  grand  army  would  have  been 
ground  to  powder,  Philadelphia,  Baltimore,  Harrisburg, 
Washington,  New  York,  would  have  been  taken,  the 
nations  of  Europe  would  have  run  races  with  one  another 
to  recognize  the  independence  of  the  Confederacy,  and 
more  aid  than  he  needed  would  have  been  freely  tendered 
Jefferson  Davis  to  enable  him  to  realize  the  aspirations 
of  the  South  for  a  separate  government. 

In  taking  a  retrospect  of  the  conduct  of  the  bordet 
states  during  the  war  and  of  how  the  slaveholders 
therein  fought  valiantly  for  their  own  undoing,  I  am 
forced  to  the  conclusion  that  when  Abraham  Lincoln 
said  in  his  first  inaugural  address:  "I  have  no  pur- 
pose, directly  or  indirectly,  to  interfere  with  the  in- 
stitution of  slavery  in  the  states  where  it  exists.  I 
beheve  I  have  no  lawful  right  to  do  so,  and  I  have  no 
inclination  to  do  so,"  he  did  more  for  the  preservation 
of  the  Union  than  was  done  by  all  the  speeches,  great 
and  small,  delivered  since  the  confusion  of  tongues 
^t  the  Tower  of  Babelj    for  that  one  declaration  held 


88       MY    QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

hundreds  of  thousands  in  the  border  states  faithful  to 
the  Union  who  otherwise  and  naturally  would  have  gone 
with  the  South.  The  Kentuckians  and  Missourians  be- 
long to  that  class  who,  having  put  their  hands  to  the 
plow,  do  not  look  back,  and  they  fought  on  after  the 
Emancipation  Proclamation  as  bravely  and  doggedly  as 
before. 

It  may  be  that  the  fact  that  Abraham  Lincoln  and 
Jefferson  Davis  were  both  Kentuckians,  born  within  a 
few  miles  of  each  other,  added  fuel  to  the  flames  through- 
out Kentucky  and  Missouri  and  wherever  the  Kentuck- 
ians had  settled  in  large  numbers.  The  accident  of  their 
birth  in  the  same  vicinity  contributed  to  the  awful  tragedy 
the  element  of  feud,  inherent  in  the  Kentucky  character. 

At  any  rate,  Lincoln  understood  the  Kentuckians  and 
Missourians  better  than  any  other  Republican  President, 
and  to  the  day  of  his  death  they  had  a  warm  place  in  his 
sympathetic  heart. 

More  than  this,  the  border-state  men  fought,  whatever 
their  rank. 

The  only  instance  on  record  during  the  entire  war  of 
one  field  ofl&cer  killing  another  in  battle  was  at  Mill 
Springs,  when  Gen.  Speed  Smith  Fry,  of  Kentucky,  a 
Union  soldier,  shot  and  killed  General  ZollicofFer,  com- 
manding a  brigade  of  Tennessee  Confederates.  The  only 
parallel  to  this  sanguinary  performance  in  all  military 
annals  was  the  killing  of  Tecumseh,  at  the  battle  of  the 
river  Thames,  by  Col.  Richard  M.  Johnson,  another 
Kentuckian,  popularly  called  **01d  Dick." 

Ed  Porter  Thompson,  of  Kentucky,  a  Confederate  cap- 
tain, hobbled  into  the  battle  of  Murfreesboro  on  his 
crutches,  and  for  two  days  fought  side  by  side  with  those 
possessing  the  soundest  and  most  stalwart  legs,  thereby 
rivaling  the  far-resounding  feats  of  Charles  Twelfth  of 
Sweden  at  Pultowa,  and  Gen.  Joseph  Wheeler  at  San- 
tiago, who  was  carried  into  battle  on  a  stretcher. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  89. 

One  of  my  own  constituents,  Capt.  P.  Wells,  is  the  only 
soldier,  living  or  dead,  so  far  as  history  tells,  that  ever 
had  a  wooden  leg  shot  off  in  battle,  for  the  reason,  per- 
haps, that  he  is  the  only  soldier  that  ever  went  into  battle 
with  a  wooden  leg.  He  survived  his  wound  to  become  a 
wealthy  and  enthusiastic  Populist. 

In  Missouri  and  Kentucky  the  war  was  waged  with 
unspeakable  bitterness,  sometimes  with  inhuman  cruelty. 
It  was  fought  by  men  in  single  combat,  in  squads,  in 
companies,  in  regiments,  in  great  armies,  in  the  open,  in 
fortified  towns,  and  in  ambush,  under  the  Stars  and 
Stripes,  under  the  Stars  and  Bars,  and  under  the  black 
flag.  The  arch-fiend  himself  seems  to  have  been  on  the 
field  in  person,  inspiring,  directing,  commanding.  Up 
in  northern  Missouri,  Gen.  John  McNeil  took  twelve  inno- 
cent men  out  and  shot  them  in  cold  blood,  because  it  was 
supposed  that  some  bushwhacker  had  killed  a  Union 
man.  That  is  known  in  local  history  as  "the  Palmyra 
massacre,"  and  has  "damned"  John  McNeil  "to  ever- 
lasting fame."  It  turned  out  afterward  that  the  Union 
man  was  still  alive,  and  so  the  twelve  men  had  died  in 
vain,  even  according  to  the  hard  rule  of  lex  talionis. 

At  Centralia  one  day  a  Wabash  train  containing  more 
than  thirty  Union  soldiers  was  captured  by  Bill  Anderson, 
a  guerrilla  chief,  who  had  sustained  some  grievous  personal 
injury  at  the  hands  of  the  Unionists,  and  whose  blood 
some  subtle  mental  alchemy  had  converted  into  gall. 
He  deliberately  took  them  out  and  shot  them,  every  one, 
as  though  they  had  been  so  many  wolves. 

Having  completed  that  gory  job,  he  marched  out  to  a 
skirt  of  timber,  about  a  mile  from  town,  and  camped  at 
the  foot  of  a  long,  gentle  prairie  slope.  Shortly  after  a 
certain  Colonel  Johnson,  with  a  body  of  Union  cavalry, 
followed  him  and  took  position  on  the  ridge  of  the  prairie. 
The  sight  of  them  made  Anderson  wild  with  delight  and 
whetted  his  appetite  for  blood;  so  he  mounted  his  eighty 


90       MY    QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

men,  the  most  superb  horsemen  in  the  world,  who  with 
bridle  reins  between  their  teeth  and  a  navy  revolver  in 
each  hand,  rode  up  on  Johnson's  i6o  men,  who  were 
fooHshly  dismounted,  and,  firing  to  right  and  left,  killed 
143  of  them,  and  would  have  killed  the  other  17  if  they 
could  have  been  caught.  Only  one  man  was  taken  alive, 
and  he  badly  wounded,  the  legend  in  the  neighborhood 
being  that  he  saved  himself  by  giving  the  Masonic  sign 
of  distress. 

Such  are  samples  of  the  Civil  War  in  Missouri  and 
Kentucky. 

The  survivors  of  those  cruel  days,  Union  and  Con- 
federate, are  now  living  side  by  side,  cultivating  assidu- 
ously the  arts  of  peace  in  the  commonwealths  of  Missouri 
and  Kentucky,  the  most  delectable  places  for  human 
habitation  beneath  the  stars. 

One  thing  that  contributed  largely  to  the  general  con- 
fusion and  bitterness  was  the  great  variety  of  opinion. 
There  were  Union  men  without  any  qualifying  addendum. 
Conditional  Union  men.  Secessionists,  and  States'  Rights 
men.  Those  who  most  effectually  tied  the  hands  of  the 
Secessionists  and  who  unwittingly  but  most  largely  played 
into  the  hands  of  the  Unionists  were  the  advocates  of 
"armed  neutrality,"  certainly  the  most  preposterous 
theory  ever  hatched  in  the  brain  of  man.  Who  was  its 
father  cannot  now  be  definitely  ascertained,  as  nobody  is 
anxious  to  claim  the  dubious  honor  of  its  paternity. 
What  it  really  meant  may  be  shown  by  an  incident  that 
happened  in  the  great  historic  county  of  Pike,  where  I 
now  reside — a  county  which  furnished  one  brigadier- 
general  and  five  colonels  to  the  Union  army  and  three 
colonels  to  the  Confederate,  with  a  full  complement  of 
officers  and  men. 

Early  in  1861  a  great  "neutrality  meeting"  was  held 
at  Bowling  Green,  the  county-seat.  Hon.  William  L. 
Gatewood,  a  prominent  lawyer,  a  Virginian  by  birth,  an 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  91 

ardent  Southern  sympathizer,  subsequently  a  state  sena- 
tor, was  elected  chairman.  The  Pike  County  orators 
were  out  in  full  force,  but  chief  among  them  was  Hon. 
George  W.  Anderson,  also  a  prominent  lawyer,  an  East 
Tennesseean  by  nativity,  afterward  a  colonel  in  the 
Union  Army,  state  senator,  and  for  four  years  a  Member 
of  Congress.  Eloquence  was  on  tap  and  flowed  freely. 
Men  of  all  shades  of  opinion  fraternized;  they  passed 
strong  and  ringing  resolutions  in  favor  of  "armed  neu- 
trality," and  "all  went  merry  as  a  marriage-bell." 

Chairman  Gatewood  was  somewhat  mystified  and  not 
altogether  satisfied  by  the  harmonious  proceedings;  so, 
after  adjournment  sine  die,  he  took  Anderson  out  under 
a  convenient  tree  and  in  his  shrill  tenor,  nervously  in- 
quired, "George,  what  does  *  armed  neutrality'  mean, 
anyhow?"  Anderson,  in  his  deep  bass,  growled,  "It 
means  guns  for  the  Union  men  and  none  for  the  rebels!" 
— the  truth  and  wisdom  of  which  remark  are  now  per- 
fectly apparent.  So  it  was,  verily.  Anderson  had  hit 
the  bull's-eye,  and  no  mistake.  If  he  had  orated  for  an 
entire  month  he  could  not  have  stated  the  case  more 
luminously  or  more  comprehensively.  He  had  exhausted 
the  subject.  Before  the  moon  had  waxed  and  waned 
again  the  leaders  of  that  "neutrality"  love -feast  were 
hurrying  to  and  fro,  beating  up  for  volunteers  in  every 
nook  and  corner  of  the  county,  some  for  service  in  the 
Union,  others  for  service  in  the  Confederate  Army. 

But  it  is  proverbial  that  "hindsight  is  better  than  fore- 
sight." Men  must  be  judged  by  their  own  knowledge 
at  the  time  they  acted,  not  by  ours;  by  the  circumstances 
with  which  they  were  surrounded,  and  not  by  those 
which  environ  us.  What  may  appear  unfathomable 
problems  to  the  wise  men  of  one  generation  may  be  clear 
as  crystal  to  even  the  dullest  of  the  succeeding  generation. 
However  ridiculous  "armed  neutrality,"  judged  by  the 
hard  logic  of  events,  may  appear  in  the  retrospect,  how- 


92       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

ever  untenable  we  now  know  it  to  have  been,  the  fact 
remains,  nevertheless,  that  it  was  honestly  believed  in 
and  enthusiastically  advocated  by  thousands  of  capable, 
brave,  and  honest  men  all  over  Kentucky  and  Missouri, 
many  of  whom  afterward  won  laurels  on  the  battle-field 
and  laid  down  their  lives  in  one  army  or  the  other  in 
defense  of  what  they  deemed  the  right.  • 


CHAPTER  V 

Kansas — Gras^oppers — I  locate  in  Missouri — Teach  school — Edit  a  paper — 
Practise  law — Prosecuting  attorney — Lawsuits — Officeholding — ^Transyl- 
vania— Shooting-scrape — Attend  theater  to  hear  "Faust" — ^Teach  singingin 
public  school — Raise  Sunday-school  class — Pleasant  recollections  of  letting 
ofF  young  first  offenders  with  fines  or  jail  sentences — Unwittingly  carry  a 
challenge — Preside  at  religious  debate — Two  humble  and  noble  servants 
of  God. 

IN  the  autumn  of  1867  I  went  to  Lexington,  Kentucky, 
and  entered  what  was  then  called  **  Kentucky  Uni- 
versity." It  was  the  first  great  institution  of  learning 
west  of  the  AUeghanies.  In  the  earlier  days  it  was  de- 
nominated Transylvania  University,  a  beautiful  name 
which  has  been  restored  to  it  in  these  later  times.  I  lived 
in  a  ramshackle  old  building  on  the  campus  known  as 
"The  Barracks,"  because  the  soldiers  built  it  during  the 
war.  It  was  made  of  wide  planks,  set  up  on  end  and 
stripped  with  narrower  planks.  It  was  rented  to  poor 
students  at  five  dollars  per  head  per  annum,  four  students 
to  the  room.  The  apartments  were  neither  spacious  nor 
handsome,  but  they  sufficed  for  our  simple  wants.  A 
capacious  brick  dormitory  now  occupies  the  site  of  "The 
Barracks."  Students  therein  are  better  housed  than  we 
were,  but  they  do  not  learn  any  more  than  we  did. 

At  that  time  Robert  Graham,  one  of  nature's  noble- 
men, was  president  of  the  university.  Dr.  John  H. 
Neville,  the  third  handsomest  man  I  ever  saw,  was  pro- 
fessor of  Greek.  He  divided  the  whole  world  into  Greeks 
and  barbarians,  those  who  could  not  read  Greek  being 
the  barbarians.    A  student  who  was  dull  in  Greek  was 


94       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

to  him  persona  non  grata,  but  he  was  all  kindness  and 
enthusiasm  for  those  who  were  bright  in  Greek.  They 
had  semiannual  examinations,  and  at  the  first  one  in 
Greek  William  H.  Graham,  son  of  President  Robert 
Graham;  Dr.  WiUiam  Benjamin  Smith,  now  professor 
emeritus  of  astronomy  at  Tulane  University,  and  on  the 
Carnegie  Foundation,  one  of  the  profoundest  living  schol- 
ars; Rev.  Worth  Yancy,  now  deceased,  and  myself  were 
graded  a  hundred  on  a  scale  of  lOO.  That  was  one  of 
the  happiest  days  of  my  life — ^happier  than  when  I  was 
elected  to  my  first  office,  happier  than  when  I  was  first 
elected  to  Congress  or  elected  Speaker,  happier  than  on 
any  other  days  of  my  life  except  the  day  I  was  married 
and  the  days  on  which  my  children  were  born.  Achiev- 
ing that  grade  in  Greek  was  my  first  victory  among 
strangers  and  it  filled  me  with  courage  and  hope.  Yancy 
was  my  friend  as  long  as  he  lived.  His  son,  Hogan 
Yancy,  a  successful  lawyer  of  Lexington,  Kentucky,  is 
my  friend  now. 

Young  Yancy  was  among  the  first  Kentuckians  who 
declared  openly  for  me  for  President,  and  he  rendered 
me  yeoman  service  because  of  the  warm  friendship  be- 
tween his  father  and  myself. 

Prof.  WiUiam  H.  Graham,  late  of  California,  now  de- 
ceased, was  one  of  my  most  enthusiastic  supporters  in 
the  Golden  State.  Not  long  since  his  children  came  to 
see  me  in  the  Speaker's  room  at  the  Capitol.  Nobody 
has  received  a  warmer  welcome  than  the  children  of  my 
old  classmate,  the  grandchildren  of  my  well-beloved  friend 
and  mentor.  President  Robert  Graham,  whose  influence 
has  rested  upon  me  like  a  benediction  all  my  life.  Dr. 
WilUam  B.  Smith,  the  distinguished  author  and  astrono- 
mer, and  1  are  still  close  friends  and  write  each  other 
occasionally. 

My  grade  in  Greek  also  made  a  lifelong  friend  of  hand- 
some, haughty  Professor  Neville,    When  I  returned  to 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  95 

the  university  in  the  fall  of  1868,  he  walked  half-way 
across  the  campus  to  welcome  me  back.  It  is  pleasant 
to  recall  these  occurrences  after  the  lapse  of  so  many 
years. 

There  is  no  friend  like  the  old  friend  who  has  shared  our  morning 

days. 
No  greeting  like  his  welcome,  no  homage  like  his  praise. 

I  attended  Transylvania  University  three  years  and 
two  months,  teaching  school  during  the  summer  vaca- 
tions to  make  what  money  I  could.  My  father,  from 
his  small  earnings,  gave  me  all  he  could  spare,  and  my 
sister  Elizabeth  (wife  of  Rev.  J.  J.  Haley,  of  Lodi,  Cali- 
fornia) let  me  have  such  sums  as  she  could  from  her 
salary  as  a  teacher.  The  truth  is  that  she  and  I  helped 
each  other  along  as  much  as  possible.  We  stood  up  for 
each  other  loyally;  but  all  three  of  us  together  could 
scrape  up  only  about  two  dollars  per  week  for  my  neces- 
sities at  the  university.  It  is  superfluous  to  state  that 
I  did  not  live  in  luxury,  but  I  stood  at  the  head  of  my 
class. 

After  attending  the  university  for  three  years  and  two 
months  I  was,  in  October,  1870,  expelled  for  shooting 
at  a  fellow-student  named  Webb,  from  Ohio.  I  would 
not  mention  it  save  for  the  fact  that  it  was  greatly  mag- 
nified in  the  presidential  campaign  of  191 2,  very  much 
to  my  detriment.  We  fell  out  in  an  argument  over  the 
supper-hour  in  our  barracks  mess.  Webb  and  I  were 
both  of  unusual  strength.  He  was  my  senior  by  some 
three  or  four  years,  and  had  been  a  sailor  on  the  Great 
Lakes,  while  I  had  lived  and  labored  on  a  farm — the  best 
school  for  physical  training  in  the  world.  One  night  he 
came  into  our  room  and  began  a  conversation  about  the 
hour  for  supper.  He  wanted  it  at  six  because  he  clerked 
in  a  shoe-store  in  the  afternoon,  while  the  rest  wanted  it 
at  half  past  five.    The  conversation,  warm  from  the  first. 


96       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY    OF 

developed  into  a  quarrel.  He  called  me  a  liar,  where- 
upon I  cracked  him  over  the  head  with  a  small  piece  of 
plank  and  we  cHnched.  Nothing  more  serious  would 
have  grown  out  of  it,  most  probably,  than  blackened  eyes 
and  bloody  noses  had  not  one  of  my  room-mates,  a  young 
giant  named  Thomson,  grabbed  me  backholts  and  pinned 
both  my  arms  to  my  body.  Webb  squared  off  and  hit 
me  a  hard  jolt  between  the  eyes  and  another  on  my 
mouth.  I  kept  telling  Thomson  either  to  let  me  loose 
or  to  knock  Webb  down.  He  was  so  excited  that  he  did 
neither.  Wild  with  rage,  I  finally  threw  him  off,  Webb 
still  pounding  me.  Under  the  head  of  the  bed  I  had  an 
old  revolver,  whose  cylinder  would  not  revolve  except 
by  hand  manipulation,  for  which  I  had  swapped  a  German 
grammar  and  a  French  grammar.  I  got  that  and  fired 
at  Webb.  Thomson  knocked  my  pistol  hand  up  and  the 
bullet  went  about  an  inch  above  Webb's  head  and  lodged 
in  the  door-casing.  That  ended  the  fight.  The  strange 
part  of  the  story  is,  not  that  two  hot-blooded,  high-strung 
young  men  should  get  into  a  personal  encounter,  when 
and  where  personal  encounters  were  frequent,  but  that 
the  gigantic  Thomson,  who  was  my  friend  and  who  dis- 
liked Webb,  should  in  his  excitement  hold  me  while  Webb 
was  free  to  pound  me.  That  was  unwise,  but  in  knock- 
ing my  pistol  hand  up  he  acted  with  great  wisdom.  He 
thought,  as  I  struck  the  first  blow,  by  holding  me  he 
would  end  the  fight.  When  two  men  are  fighting  it  is 
always  dangerous  to  hold  one  and  not  both.  I  knew  a 
man  to  be  stabbed  to  death  while  a  friend  was  holding  him. 
I  went  immediately  to  see  the  president  of  the  uni- 
versity (President  White,  who  had  succeeded  Graham), 
and  stated  the  case  to  him  precisely  as  it  was,  hoping 
that  my  high  standing  as  a  student  would  save  me  from 
any  severer  penalty  than  a  public  reprimand  or  a  short 
suspension.  He  said,  however,  that  there  had  been  so 
much  fighting,  carousing,  and  violation  of  the  rules  among 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  97 

the  students  that  the  patience  of  the  faculty  was  ex- 
hausted, and  that  an  example  would  have  to  be  made 
of  me  in  order  to  scare  the  rest.  The  result  was  that  I 
was  expelled.  I  went  home  and  taught  school  for  two 
years,  when  the  faculty  gave  me  a  written  invitation  to 
return.  I  declined  to  do  so,  and  went  to  Bethany  Col- 
lege, West  Virginia,  instead. 

I  declined  to  return  to  Transylvania,  largely  for  the 
reason  that  the  Board  of  Curators  had  precipitated  a 
theological  quarrel,  which  had  reduced  the  number  of 
students  from  nearly  eight  hundred  to  fifty. 

My  expulsion  influenced  the  lives  not  only  of  myself, 
but  of  at  least  three  others.  Class  honors  at  Transyl- 
vania University  were  decided  strictly  by  grades.  Every- 
body knew  that  the  first  honors  of  the  class  to  graduate 
in  1 871  lay  between  John  O.  Hopkins  (subsequently  pro- 
fessor of  Greek  in  Butler  University)  and  myself. 

When  Transylvania  opened  in  September,  1870,  which 
was  about  two  months  prior  to  the  shooting-affray,  Hop- 
kins came  to  me  for  the  purpose  of  figuring  out  our 
average  grades,  stating  frankly  that,  as  he  was  going  to 
be  a  college  professor  and  having  a  professorship  prom- 
ised him,  he  was  very  anxious  for  the  class  honors,  as  it 
would  promote  his  career,  and  that  if  my  average  grade 
excelled  his  he  would  drop  back  into  the  next  class,  where 
he  could  easily  win.  We  figured  out  the  averages  and 
mine  was  about  one  per  cent,  above  his.  So  he  dropped 
back  into  the  Class  of  1872,  taking  only  about  half  the 
Senior  year's  studies,  devoting  much  of  his  time  to  general 
reading.  That  left  me  without  serious  opposition  for 
the  class  honors.  But  I  was  expelled,  and  Hopkins 
dropped  out.  The  first  honors,  therefore,  went  to  James 
Lane  Allen,  the  novelist,  and  the  second  honors  to  Henry 
W.  White,  son  of  President  White,  whereas  neither  Allen 
nor  White  would  have  received  class  honors  had  Hopkins 
and  I  continued  in  the  Class  of  1871. 

Vol.  I.— 7 


98       MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

My  expulsion  really  sent  me  to  Bethany  College,  where 
I  graduated  with  the  highest  honors  in  1873,  which  fact 
more  than  all  else  made  me  president  of  Marshall  College, 
West  Virginia,  at  twenty-three — the  youngest  college 
president  in  America. 

What  of  my  friend  Webb?  One  night,  some  twenty- 
five  or  thirty  years  after  the  above-described  fight,  I 
lectured  in  a  small  city  in  northern  Ohio.  Next  morning 
a  bright  young  man  named  Webb  came  to  see  me  and 
said  that  his  father,  who  had  been  a  student  at  Kentucky 
University  in  1870,  when  he  learned  that  I  was  to  lecture 
there,  told  him  to  call  upon  me  and  find  out  if  I  were  the 
James  B.  Clark  who  attended  that  university  that  year. 
I  answered  in  the  affirmative  and  then  discovered  that 
his  father  was  my  Webb.  I  asked  him  where  his  father 
was.  He  said  he  was  teaching  school  about  twenty  miles 
out  in  the  country  and  would  have  called  in  person 
except  for  the  distance.  I  inquired  kindly  after  his 
father  and  sent  him  my  greetings. 

A  year  or  two  after  that  my  fellow-student, Webb,  wrote 
me  about  his  brother's  disputed  homestead  claim  in  Okla- 
homa, asking  me  to  help  straighten  it  out,  and  I  complied 
to  the  best  of  my  ability. 

While  a  student  at  Transylvania  University  at  Lex- 
ington I  attended  a  theater  for  the  first  time.  Edwin 
Forrest,  then  in  his  old  age  and  making  his  last  tour  of 
the  country,  was  playing  "Richelieu."  I  have  witnessed 
many  theatrical  performances  since  then,  but  none — no, 
not  one — that  so  thrilled  me  as  did  that.  I  ran  the  risk 
of  being  expelled  in  order  to  see  and  hear  the  great 
tragedian,  for  I  guessed  correctly  that  he  was  making 
his  farewell  tour,  and  the  penalty  inflicted  by  that  some- 
what strait-laced  institution  of  learning  upon  pupils  for 
attending  theatricals  was  expulsion;  but  when  I  arrived 
at  the  theater,  scanned  the  audience,  and  found  two- 
thirds   of  the   professors   and   hundreds   of  my   fellow- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  99 

students  present,  I  did  not  bother  my  head  about  the 
aftermath. 

I  had  the  good  luck  to  sit  immediately  behind  Gen. 
John  C.  Breckenridge,  and  to  Hsten  to  his  comments  on 
the  actor  and  the  play. 

From  Lexington,  Forrest  journeyed  to  Louisville. 
Next  day  The  Courier- Journal  contained  a  scathing  edi- 
torial entitled,  **Is  Edwin  Forrest  a  Great  Actor  or  an 
Unmitigated  Old  Bellower?"  which  seemed  to  me  then, 
and  seems  to  me  now,  a  gross  and  cruel  outrage  upon  one 
of  the  ablest  actors  that  ever  trod  the  boards  in  America. 

It  is  surprising  to  me  that  so  Httle  attention  is  paid  to 
vocal  music  in  our  common  schools.  To  be  able  to  sing 
is  a  fine  accompHshment  as  well  as  the  source  of  much 
pleasure.  I  am  not  talking  about  singing  after  the 
manner  of  Jenny  Lind,  or  Patti,  or  Caruso,  but  singing 
in  a  fairly  competent  way  religious  songs,  patriotic  songs, 
and  love  songs.  Lord  Byron  said  that  Tom  Moore  sing- 
ing his  own  melodies  was  the  perfection  of  poetry. 

It  is  an  easy  matter  to  teach  children  to  sing  tolerably 
well,  and  it  does  not  subtract  much  time  from  their 
studies.  I  know  that  by  experience.  When  I  took 
charge  of  the  public  school  at  Camden,  a  small  village 
in  a  remote  part  of  Anderson  County,  in  December,  1870, 
I  was  informed  that  the  teacher  of  the  public  school  in 
that  community  was  expected  to  be  also  the  superinten- 
dent of  the  Sunday-school,  which  astounded  me.  I  had 
never  attended  Sunday-school  a  day  in  my  life.  In  fact, 
I  had  no  chance,  as  there  were  no  Sunday-schools  in  the 
neighborhood;  but  at  it  I  went.  I  found  that  they  had 
no  literature;  no  Sunday-school  song-books;  nothing  to 
interest  children.  The  sober-sided  grown-ups  ran  the 
whole  thing  in  a  way  not  pleasing  to  children,  but  after 
the  manner  of  a  convocation  of  ruHng  elders;  I  soon 
determined  that  if  I  had  to  be  superintendent  of  a  Sunday- 
school   I   would   have   a   sure-enough,   live,   up-to-date 


100   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Sunday-school  to  superintend.  So  one  Sunday  morning 
I  made  a  short  speech  to  that  effect,  stating,  among 
other  things,  that  in  order  to  have  a  Sunday-school  worth 
while  money  was  necessary  to  buy  supplies,  and  that, 
unless  the  people  who  desired  the  Sunday-school  to  con- 
tinue "came  down  with  the  dust,''  I  would  resign.  I 
then  took  a  slip  of  paper  out  of  my  pocket  and  read  out 
the  amount  that  each  man  and  woman  should  contribute. 
I  think  it  surprised  them,  but  not  a  soul  objected  to  my 
arbitrary  assessment,  and  in  ten  minutes  I  had  the  neces- 
sary funds.  It  goes  without  saying  that  that  was  a  high- 
handed proceeding — in  the  nature  of  a  forced  loan;  but 
it  worked. 

I  understood  music  somewhat  and  was  a  fair  bass 
singer  at  that  time,  before  much  open-air  speaking  to 
large  crowds  had  strained  my  vocal  cords  to  such  an 
extent  as  to  ruin  my  voice  for  singing  purposes.  I  took 
the  Sunday-school  books  to  the  public  school  and  for 
twenty  or  thirty  minutes  every  day  taught  the  songs  to 
the  children,  who  entered  into  the  practice  heartily  and 
joyously.  Soon  they  became  tiptop  singers.  Then  I  had 
them  sing  in  Sunday-school,  which  gave  pleasure  to  the 
adults.  The  Sunday-school  began  to  grow;  so  did  the 
audiences,  to  hear  the  children  sing,  until  my  Sunday- 
school  became  the  pride  of  the  neighborhood  and  the 
talk  of  the  countryside. 

Once  in  a  while  I  gave  a  short  talk  to  my  Sunday-school 
about  various  matters,  including  the  duties  of  citizenship. 
One  Sunday,  when  we  reached  the  house  of  Uncle  Billie 
Stephens,  with  whom  I  was  boarding,  he  said:  "You 
know  so  well  how  to  tell  other  folks  what  they  should 
do,  I  will  return  the  compliment  and  tell  you  what  you 
should  do — you  ought  to  preach!  If  you  will  agree  to 
be  a  preacher  in  the  Christian  Church  I  will  pay  for  your 
education  in  any  college  or  university  in  America  or 
Europe." 


AMERICAN    POklTlCS  toi 

He,  first  and  last,  repeated  that  offer  half  a  doJfen  times. 
Finally,  he  increased  it  by  saying  that  in  addition  to 
footing  my  bills  at  any  college  or  university  in  America 
or  Europe  he  would  will  me  half  his  property,  amounting 
to  twenty-five  or  thirty  thousand  dollars.  As  he  had  no 
children,  it  would  have  been  no  sin  on  my  part  to  accept 
his  generous  offer,  but  my  judgment  was  against  so  doing. 
It  was  a  great  temptation  to  a  youth  without  a  dollar, 
but  I  had  no  inclination  or  desire  to  be  a  preacher,  having 
made  up  my  mind  to  be  a  lawyer  and,  when  opportunity 
served,  to  enter  politics.  I  was  afraid  that  if  I  accepted 
his  proposition  I  might  grow  weary  of  ministerial  work 
and  abandon  it,  as  General  Garfield,  Edward  Everett, 
"Parson"  Brownlow,  Bishop  Gen.  Leonidas  Polk,  Sena- 
tor James  Harlan,  and  some  smaller  preachers  had  done. 
So  I  concluded  to  worry  along  and  earn  money  enough 
by  my  own  labor  to  finish  my  college  course — which  I  did. 

I  had  another  experience  with  Sunday-schools  to  which 
I  look  back  with  pleasure.  One  Sunday  I  observed  that 
very  few  young  men  attended  the  Bowling  Green  Sunday- 
school  of  the  Church  of  the  Disciples.  Consequently, 
during  the  ensuing  week  I  put  in  what  time  I  could  spare 
from  my  law  business  toward  recruiting  a  class  of  young 
men  who  were  attending  no  Sunday-school.  The  next 
Sunday  I  appeared  at  the  head  of  a  class  of  twenty-six 
full-grown  young  men  and  taught  them  regularly  until 
I  became  too  busy  running  for  Congress.  Some  members 
of  my  class  are  very  active  and  influential  in  Sunday- 
school  and  church  work  even  to  this  day. 

Once  in  June  my  father  sent  me  five  dollars  with  which 
to  come  home.  I  spent  the  money  for  half-dollar  paper- 
covered  editions  of  the  poets,  took  my  old  oil-cloth  satchel 
on  my  back,  and  walked  home,  fifty  miles,  in  two  days, 
resting  occasionally  under  the  shade  of  the  trees  to  read 
Campbell's  "Pleasures  of  Hope,"  the  finest  long  poem  in- 
cur vernacular.     I  finally  committed  most  of  it  to  memory. 


102  MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

very  "much  to  my  advantage,  and  can  repeat  much  of  it 
to  this  day.  I  was  a  lusty  young  fellow  and  the  long 
tramp  did  me  no  harm  except  to  make  my  leg  muscles 
sore  for  a  day  or  two.  I  set  this  incident  down  here  not 
because  it  is  important,  but  because  so  many  different 
versions  of  it  have  been  set  afloat  by  various  friends  in 
the  newspapers. 

At  Camden,  in  Anderson  County,  I  had  many  friends, 
three  of  whom  rendered  me  most  timely  financial  assist- 
ance when  I  needed  it  most.  They  were  Uncle  Billie 
Stephens,  a  well-to-do  farmer;  Dr.  Thomas  H.  Hudson, 
now  a  prominent  physician  at  Kansas  City;  and  Dr.  E.  E. 
Hume,  who  recently  died,  after  being  for  years  the  leading 
physician  at  Frankfort,  Kentucky.  Hume  and  I  boarded 
and  roomed  together  at  the  hospitable  home  of  Uncle 
Billie,  who  was  a  remarkable  personage.  I  never  knew 
a  man  of  higher  character  or  of  more  common  sense  than 
Uncle  Billie,  but  for  some  strange  reason  he  had  never 
learned  to  read  or  write,  though  he  was  an  elder  in  the 
Christian  Church,  a  good  business  man,  and  an  influen- 
tial citizen.  He  was  eager  for  information  and  made  me 
and  others  read  to  him  by  the  hour.  When  anybody  was 
reading  to  him,  nothing  short  of  an  earthquake  would 
distract  his  attention  from  the  reading;  consequently, 
when  an  article  was  finished,  he  practically  knew  it  by 
heart.  He  knew  thousands  of  Bible  quotations,  and  in 
his  arguments  on  religious  subjects,  of  which  he  was 
exceedingly  fond,  he  would  give  verse  and  book  with 
astonishing  accuracy.  Many  and  many  an  hour  did  I 
spend  reading  to  him  Lard's  Quarterly,  McGarvey's  Com- 
mentaries, and  books  of  that  character.  He  had  a  fatherly 
love  for  me,  which  I  returned  with  filial  affection. 

Uncle  Billie's  wonderful  power  of  mental  concentration 
has  always  reminded  me  of  the  fine  story  told  of  Ar- 
chimedes, the  famous  mathematician. 

Dr.  Tom  Hudson,  always  delicate  in  health,  has  devoted 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  103 

his  life  largely  to  helping  others.  He  and  I  became  ac- 
quainted while  attending  a  Christmas  holiday  singing- 
school,  taught  by  my  father  in  1866-67,  ^"^  have  been 
bosom  friends  ever  since,  though  we  haven't  seen  each 
other  a  dozen  times  in  thirty-five  years.  He  and  I  roomed 
together  at  Kentucky  University  till  his  health  gave  out 
and  he  was  compelled  to  go  home.  He  helped  me  out 
of  a  hole  repeatedly  by  lending  me  small  sums  at  the 
psychological  moment.  He  is  a  great  singer,  and  his 
voice  has  retained  its  sweetness  to  an  extraordinary 
degree.  Recently  he  and  his  son  were  our  guests  in 
Washington  for  a  week,  and  we  enjoyed  their  visit 
intensely. 

Dr.  Enoch  Edgar  Hume  also  aided  me  financially  at 
various  times  when  I  was  hard  up.  He  was  a  large, 
robust,  handsome  man,  who  turned  no  one  sick  or  afflicted 
away.  He  attended  all,  white  or  black,  rich  or  poor,  pay 
or  no  pay.  He  rode  for  miles  around,  in  all  sorts  of 
weather,  to  attend  his  patients.  He  was  the  first 
physician  to  treat  Gov.  WiUiam  Goebel  when  he  was 
assassinated.  By  rooming  with  him  for  two  years  I 
learned  the  hardships,  inconveniences,  and  sacrifices  of  a 
country  doctor's  life.  From  that  day  to  this  I  have  had 
a  high  opinion  of  and  deep  sympathy  with  country  doc- 
tors. This  began  with  the  love  and  admiration  I  had 
for  Doctor  Hume.  He  was  a  splendid  physician,  and 
no  nobler  man  ever  breathed.  God  bless  him  in  his 
gravel  His  only  son,  Edgar,  is  now  a  surgeon  in  the 
army,  making  a  splendid  record  and  with  a  magnificent 
prospect. 

There  was  an  old  preacher  in  the  Christian  Church, 
Elder  Levan  Merritt,  a  most  pious  man,  an  old  bachelor, 
who  sometimes  loaned  my  father  small  sums  to  help  me 
through  college,  which  I  paid  back  with  interest  to  his 
estate  after  he  was  dead. 

My  classmate.   Rev.   Worth  Yancy,  who  picked  up 


104   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

several  coins  of  the  realm  by  preaching  Sundays  in  coun- 
try churches  near  Lexington,  also  loaned  me  small  sums 
of  money. 

There  was  one  man  at  Mackville  from  whom  I  could 
borrow  money  in  small  sums  when  absolutely  necessary. 
That  was  Doctor  McGhee,  one  of  my  old  teachers,  who 
w^as  a  splendid  but  excessively  modest  Christian  gentle- 
man. I  remember  that  while  at  Transylvania  Univer- 
sity, a  fellow-student  had  a  Webster's  Unabridged  Dic- 
tionary for  sale  at  ten  dollars.  I  hankered  after  that 
dictionary.  I  wrote  Doctor  McGhee  for  the  ten,  telling 
him  what  I  wanted  it  for,  and  he  sent  it,  very  much  to 
my  delight.  I  did  not  pay  it  back  for  a  year,  but  I  have 
that  book  yet.  It  is  dog-eared  and  greasy,  but  I  keep  it 
in  memory  of  my  good  friend,  though  I  have  two  or  three 
of  later  date.  The  man  from  whom  I  bought  that  dic- 
tionary was  an  emotional  young  Irishman  named  Ed 
Kinnefick,  who  finally  went  crazy  because  he  could  not 
convert  the  world  fast  enough.     Of  him  more  anon. 

So  far  as  I  can  remember,  the  persons  named  are  all 
that  ever  lent  me  or  my  father  money  to  help  me  through 
college.     I  will  cherish  their  names  fondly  forever. 

Kinnefick  lived  at  Centralia,  Missouri,  near  the  scene 
of  the  astounding  victory  of  Bill  Anderson,  the  guerrilla 
chieftain.  Kinnefick  was  a  boy  of  some  fifteen  or  sixteen, 
working  as  a  hostler  in  a  livery-stable.  Anderson's  men 
that  day  were  wearing  blue  uniforms  and  were  pretty 
full  of  whisky.  They  were  chasing  down  Union  men, 
shooting  some  and  maltreating  others.  Kinnefick,  judg- 
ing from  the  color  of  their  clothes,  erroneously  concluded 
that  they  were  Federals,  so  when  a  group  of  them  rode 
up  to  the  livery-stable  and  catechized  him  as  to  his  poli- 
tics, he  said,  **I  am  a  poor  Union  boyl"  It's  a  wonder 
they  did  not  shoot  him,  but  they  happened  to  be  in  a 
good  humor.  They  took  buggy-whips,  and  Kinnefick 
declared  they  must  have  hit  him  a  thousand  lashes. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  105 

The  way  I  happened  to  be  elected  president  of  Marshall 
College  when  I  was  only  twenty-three  was  this :  I  was  at 
Bethany  College  only  one  collegiate  year,  but  I  spent  the 
summer  there  prior  to  the  opening  of  the  term.  Several 
students  were  there  and  told  me  who  were  certain  of  the 
first  and  second  honors  the  next  year.  They  remarked, 
further,  that  I  would  be  lucky  to  graduate  at  all  in  one 
year.  I  thought  so,  too,  and,  knowing  that  college 
standing  depends  somewhat  on  teachers  and  pupils  under- 
standing the  mental  habits  and  idiosyncrasies  of  one 
another,  I  never  dreamed  of  taking  the  honors;  but  I 
buckled  down  to  my  studies,  nevertheless.  The  first 
month  of  that  college  session  was  one  of  the  lonesomest 
and  bluest  of  my  hfe.  Nobody  knew  me  and  I  knew 
nobody.  The  other  students  were  jolly  among  them- 
selves as  **01d  King  Cole."  They  had  a  royal  time, 
while  I  devoted  my  days  and  nights  to  my  books.  At 
Bethany  they  gave  out  grades  at  the  end  of  each  month. 
At  the  end  of  the  first  month  I  was  ahead  of  all  my  class- 
mates in  everything.  The  effect  was  electrical.  It  acted 
like  a  bombshell,  showing  me  that  I  had  a  chance  for 
first  honors  and  astounding  my  competitors  by  the  same 
fact — there  being  no  law  or  rule  against  it.  The  students, 
the  professors,  and  even  the  villagers  divided  into  Clark 
and  anti-Clark  factions,  as  in  politics.  The  war  raged 
with  utmost  fury  till  in  June,  1873,  when  the  faculty  gave 
me  the  highest  honors,  dividing  the  second  honors  between 
the  two  men  who,  I  had  been  told  upon  entrance,  were 
destined  to  receive  the  first  and  second  honors.  One  of 
them  appealed  from  the  decision  of  the  faculty  to  the 
Board  of  Regents,  who  sustained  the  faculty  and  wisely 
changed  the  law  making  two  years'  attendance  a  condi- 
tion precedent  to  competing  for  honors. 

The  row  got  into  the  newspapers  and  attracted  much 
attention.  One  day  Col.  Alexander  Campbell,  president 
of  the  Board  of  Regents,  son  of  the  great  philosopher  and 


io6   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

theologian,  Alexander  Campbell,  Sr.,  asked  me  what  I 
was  going  to  do.  I  told  him  I  wanted  to  teach  a  year 
and  then  study  law.  He  repHed:  *'There  is  going  to  be 
a  vacancy  in  the  presidency  of  the  West  Liberty  Normal 
School  at  twelve  hundred  per  annum.  I  am  one  of  the 
regents.  Give  me  your  application  and  perhaps  I  can 
get  it  for  you." 

I  wrote  out  an  application,  stating  my  name  and  age, 
including  these  words,  "I  am  a  native  of  Kentucky,  over 
six  feet  in  height,  weigh  one  hundred  and  seventy-four 
pounds,  have  just  graduated  at  Bethany  College  with 
highest  honors,  am  a  Democrat  in  politics,  a  Campbellite 
in  religion,  and  a  Master  Mason."  Of  course  I  had  no 
idea  of  obtaining  the  place,  otherwise  I  would  not  have 
written  such  an  application;  but  to  my  amazement 
and  dehght  I  was  elected  president  of  Marshall  Col- 
lege at  thirteen  hundred  a  year  instead  of  West  Liberty 
Normal  School  at  twelve  hundred.  Colonel  Campbell 
did  it. 

Subsequently,  when  in  Congress,  I  endeavored  to  repay 
his  kindness  by  urging  President  Cleveland  to  appoint 
him  consul-general  to  Melbourne,  but  the  President 
appointed  another. 

After  finishing  my  year  as  president  of  Marshall  College 
and  declining  re-election,  I  entered  the  Cincinnati  Law- 
school  in  the  fall  of  1874,  graduating  April  22,  1875,  at 
the  head  of  my  class. 

I  read  law  in  Cincinnati  with  Bradstreet  and  Biddle. 
My  law  professors  were  George  Hoadly,  afterward  Gov- 
ernor; General  Force,  Alexander  Morrell,  and  Clement 
C.  Bates.  The  law  lectures  were  at  night.  It  was  at 
the  time  when  they  had  the  double-headed  Legislature  in 
Louisiana  and  pohtical  prejudice  was  at  its  worst.  After 
the  lectures  were  over  we  would  resolve  the  class  into  a 
political  debating  society,  and  the  debate  was  fast  and 
furious.    The  RepubHcans  outnumbered  the  Democrats 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  107 

two  to  one,  but,  nevertheless,  we  held  up  our  end  of  the 
argument.     I  did  my  full  share  of  debating. 

Political  excitement  ran  high  in  the  city.  One  night 
there  was  a  vast  mass-meeting  in  the  Grand  Opera  House 
to  denounce  proceedings  at  New  Orleans.  After  several 
minor  orators  had  spoken,  George  H.  Pendleton,  popu- 
larly called  "Gentleman  George,''  once  candidate  for 
President  and  later  a  United  States  senator,  then  in  the 
prime  of  his  manly  beauty  and  splendid  powers,  was 
introduced.  He  received  a  tremendous  ovation.  I  shall 
never  forget  the  first  sentence  in  his  speech — "The  sweet- 
est incense  that  ever  greeted  the  nostrils  of  a  public  man 
is  the  applause  of  the  people" — one  of  the  finest  epigrams 
ever  uttered. 

Among  the  Democrats  in  that  class  were  Thomas  J. 
Hudson,  of  Fredonia,  Kansas,  with  whom  I  served  in  the 
Fifty-third  Congress,  and  James  Bryan,  who  afterward 
became  Lieutenant-Governor  of  Kentucky.  Hudson  was 
considerably  older  than  I  was.  He  had  been  a  member 
of  the  Legislature  and  prosecuting  attorney  of  his  county. 
He  proposed  to  me  that  if  I  would  go  to  Kansas  with  him 
he  would  give  me  a  third  of  his  practice  the  first  two  years, 
and  half  after  that,  saying  it  was  worth  two  thousand 
five  hundred  dollars  a  year  and  could  easily  be  made 
worth  a  good  deal  more.  That  was  an  unusually  good 
offer  for  a  young  man  just  admitted  to  the  bar,  so  I 
started  to  Fredonia,  Kansas,  where  Hudson  then  lived 
and  still  lives. 

When  I  reached  Emporia,  Kansas,  I  stopped  off  to  see 
an  old  Kentucky  University  classmate  named  John  W. 
Lynn,  who  was  in  full  practice  there  and  who  was  ten  or 
twelve  years  my  senior.  He  persuaded  me  that  Fredonia 
was  not  a  very  good  location,  but  that  Wichita  was  the 
coming  town.  He  said  it  was  the  center  of  the  Texas 
cattle  trade;  Spanish  milled  dollars  rolling  around  loose 
and  Mexican  greasers  running  amuck;    a  great  many 


io8   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

cutting  and  shooting  scrapes;  and  that  if  I  would  go 
down  there  I  would  get  rich. 

Wichita  is  a  splendid  city  now,  one  of  the  best  built 
towns  of  its  size  in  America,  but  it  was  as  dead  as  a  door- 
nail then.  The  Texas  cattle  trade  had  moved  up  to 
Great  Bend;  the  Mexican  greasers  had  disappeared  over 
the  horizon;  Spanish  milled  dollars  were  conspicuous  by 
their  absence,  and  business  in  Wichita  was  at  the  lowest 
ebb.  In  addition  to  that,  everybody  was  scared  half  to 
death  about  the  grasshoppers  which  had  eaten  the  state 
up  the  year  before.  Wichita  is  built  where  the  two 
Arkansas  rivers  come  together.  On  the  banks  were  an 
abundance  of  cottonwood-trees,  the  bloom  from  which 
gathered  in  great  quantities  high  up  in  the  air,  and  every- 
body mistook  the  bloom  for  grasshoppers.  I  made  up 
my  mind  that  there  was  no  sense  in  staying  there,  as 
there  was  no  law  business  to  amount  to  anything,  and  if 
the  grasshoppers  came  every  year  the  country  would  be 
no  good.  So  I  concluded  to  get  away,  but  I  did  not  have 
money  enough  to  do  so,  and  perhaps  would  be  there  yet 
if  it  had  not  been  that  a  man  sent  me  twenty-five  dollars 
for  writing  him  a  graduating  speech  at  an  Eastern  college. 
I  thought  that  was  good  luck  then,  but  I  have  no  sort  of 
doubt  if  he  had  not  sent  me  that  check  I  would  have 
been  compelled  to  remain  in  Wichita,  and  if  1  had  re- 
mained there  that  I  would  have  been  comparatively 
wealthy  by  this  time,  as  Wichita  is  built  in  one  of  the 
richest  agricultural  sections  and  has  developed  into  a 
great  business  and  trade  center. 

I  knew  Victor  Murdock  there  when  he  was  wearing 
kilts,  which  may  account  tor  some  things  that  have  hap- 
pened in  Congress.  His  father.  Col.  Marsh  Murdock, 
who  was  state  senator,  was  then  running  a  small  weekly 
paper  called  The  Wichita  Eagle,  which  has  grown  with 
the  town  and  the  country  round  about  until  it  has  become 
a  great  and  influential  daily.     He  treated  me  kindly,  and 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  109 

when  Vic  came  to  Congress  I  gave  him  all  the  information 
that  I  knew  of  as  to  how  to  get  on,  but  Victor  did  not 
need  much  advice  and  got  on  famously. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  grasshoppers  traveled  only  as 
far  south  as  Topeka  that  year,  and  so  far  as  I  know  there 
has  never  been  one  in  the  state  since.  That  was  the  year 
the  grasshoppers  got  into  northwest  Missouri.  Governor 
Hardin  set  aside  a  day  of  humiliation  and  prayer  to  rid 
the  state  of  the  grasshopper  plague.  That  night  there 
came  one  of  the  heaviest  rains  ever  known  in  Missouri, 
and  washed  the  grasshoppers  into  the  Mississippi  River. 
There  haven't  been  any  in  the  state  since.  Pious  Mis- 
sourians  who  believe  in  special  providences  contend  to 
this  day  that  Governor  Hardin  saved  them  from  the 
grasshoppers. 

There  was  an  amusing  sequel  to  that  grasshopper  visi- 
tation many  years  thereafter.  Going  home  from  New 
York  in  the  summer  of  1893,  just  after  making  my  Tam- 
many Hall  Fourth-of-July  speech,  the  weather  in  Indiana 
and  Ohio  was  exceedingly  hot.  I  went  into  the  smoking- 
room  of  the  sleeper  to  see  if  there  was  any  one  I  knew. 
It  had  only  one  occupant — a  good-looking,  clean-shaved, 
well-dressed  man,  wearing,  among  other  things,  a  white 
lawn  tie.  I  thought  he  was  a  preacher,  but  I  had  a 
pocketful  of  cigars  and  offered  him  one,  which  he  accepted. 
I  inquired  where  he  lived.  He  replied,  "Hutchinson, 
Kansas."  I  asked  him  about  the  salt-wells  and  several 
other  things  in  the  Sunflower  State. 

He  said,  **You  seem  to  be  well  acquainted  in  Kansas." 

I  said:  "I  lived  in  Wichita  nine  weeks  in  the  spring 
and  summer  of  1875.  The  grasshoppers  drove  me  out 
of  the  state  and  I  do  not  believe  that  there  has  been  one 
in  the  state  since." 

He  looked  at  the  floor  a  moment,  and  then,  with^  an 
amazing  burst  of  profanity,  which  convinced  me  instanter 
that  he  was  not  a  preacher,  he  bellowed,  "No!  we  haven't 


no      MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   OF 

had  any  grasshoppers  since,  but  we  have  something  a 
d — d  sight  worse!" 

"In  Heaven's  name,"  I  exclaimed,  "what  is  it?" 

To  my  unspeakable  surprise  and  amusement  he  said, 
"It's  Jerry  Simpson!" 

Then  for  ten  minutes  he  roasted  Jerry — a  performance 
much  safer  in  Jerry's  absence  than  in  his  presence.  Once 
when  Jerry  and  I  had  a  tilt  in  the  House  and  he  became 
too  frisky,  I  told  that  tale  on  him,  greatly  to  the  merri- 
ment of  the  members. 

Some  of  the  friendships  which  I  formed  in  Kansas  in 
that  early  day  are  very  dear  to  me,  and  some  of  those  old 
friends  used  my  residence  of  a  few  weeks  in  Kansas  as  a 
potent  argument  in  having  the  Kansas  delegation  in- 
structed for  me  at  the  Baltimore  convention,  where,  I 
firmly  believe,  James  W.  Orr  betrayed  both  Kansas  and 
myself.  He  is  now  holding  a  fat  position  at  Washington, 
but  in  1916  he  was  beaten  out  of  his  boots  for  National 
Committeeman  by  the  outraged  Kansas  Democrats. 

While  in  Kansas  I  slept  on  a  sofa  in  the  office  of  Lawyer 
Ruggles  and  Doctor  Fabrique.  A  big-hearted  German, 
now  dead,  named  Fritz  Schnitzler,  credited  me  for  meals. 
I  feel  under  obligations  to  those  people  yet.  There  is 
also  out  there  now  Kosciuszko  Kossuth  Harris,  but  he  cut 
it  down  to  Kos.  He  is  a  stanch  Democrat,  as  well  as  his 
father.  Judge  Harris,  was  before  him.  He  went  with  me 
to  the  depot  the  night  that  I  left  Wichita,  begged  me  to 
stay  there,  saying  that  he  and  I  were  the  only  Democratic 
lawyers  in  town,  that  it  was  bound  to  be  a  great  city,  that 
the  Republican  lawyers  were  always  fooling  away  their 
time  with  politics,  and  that  there  were  so  few  Democrats 
around  that  he  and  1  would  have  no  temptation  to  play 
with  politics,  but  could  devote  ourselves  exclusively  to 
the  law  and  get  rich.  Kos  is  a  great  philosopher.  His 
theory  was  entirely  correct. 

While  in  Wichita,  and  being  dead  broke,  a  man  offered 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  in 

me  a  dollar  and  a  half  to  hoe  out  his  garden,  which  I  did. 
I  blistered  my  hands,  but  I  spent  that  dollar  and  a  half 
like  a  thoroughbred.  I  got  shaved,  took  a  young  lady 
to  the  theater,  then  to  an  ice-cream  parlor,  and  retired 
to  my  sofa-bed  with  as  little  money  as  when  I  started  in 
to  hoe  the  garden  in  the  morning.  About  the  ist  or 
2d  of  July  a  prominent  farmer  Hving  down  on  the 
Cowskin  River,  about  twenty  miles  southwest  of  Wichita, 
came  into  town  and  wanted  somebody  to  go  down  and 
make  a  Fourth-of-July  speech.  He  asked  all  the  lawyers, 
including  Ruggles,  but  none  of  them  would  go.  Ruggles 
suggested  that  I  might  be  induced  to  accept.  The  man 
said  that  if  I  would  go  he  would  give  me  five  dollars  to 
pay  my  expenses.  So,  bright  and  early  on  the  morning 
of  the  Fourth  of  July  I  mounted  an  Indian  pony,  rode 
down  to  the  Cowskin,  made  a  speech  in  a  fine  grove,  ate 
a  most  excellent  dinner  of  fried  chicken  with  the  usual 
accompaniments,  and  then  rode  back  toward  Wichita. 
Dark  came  on  and  I  was  lost.  After  wandering  around 
awhile  I  saw  a  sky-rocket  go  up.  I  knew  that  was 
Wichita,  and  rode  straight  to  the  sky-rockets.  When  I 
arrived  I  found  the  twenty-five-dollar  draft  before  re- 
ferred to. 

In  a  day  or  two  I  paid  Schnitzler  my  board  bill,  and 
pulled  out  for  Missouri.  As  I  was  starting.  Col.  William 
Mathewson  paid  me  ten  dollars  as  a  fee  in  a  suit  which 
I  had  instituted  for  him,  and  which  suit,  with  his  consent, 
I  turned  over  to  Ruggles.  That  was  the  first  money  I 
ever  received  as  a  lawyer.  I  did  not  know  more  than 
half  a  dozen  people  in  Missouri  and  I  did  not  know  where 
they  were. 

There  was  an  old  man  at  Wichita  who  had  lived 
close  to  Moberly,  Missouri,  and  he  was  always  telling  me 
what  a  fine  place  that  was,  so  I  headed  for  Moberly,  the 
"Magic  City."  I  arrived  there  with  fifty  cents  in  my 
pocket.     I  inquired  for  a  school  to  teach,  but  most  of 


112  MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

the  places  had  been  taken.  I  heard  of  a  vacancy  at  a 
little  place  called  Renick.  I  went  down  there,  applied 
for  the  school,  showed  them  my  diplomas,  certificates, 
and  so  forth,  explained  to  them  that  I  would  not  have 
the  school  if  I  was  not  hard  up,  and  induced  them  to 
raise  the  salary  from  fifty  dollars  a  month  to  fifty-five, 
notwithstanding  that  I  had  received  a  salary  of  thirteen 
hundred  dollars  per  annum  as  president  of  Marshall  Col- 
lege, West  Virginia.  They  very  generously  put  in  a 
clause  that  if  I  could  get  a  better  school  they  would  let 
me  off. 

The  next  day  I  went  to  the  superintendent  of  the  schools 
of  Randolph  County,  a  lawyer  named  Rutherford,  who 
now  lives  in  Stockton,  California,  to  get  a  certificate.  I 
explained  the  circumstances  to  him,  showed  him  my 
diplomas  and  certificates  of  having  been  president  of 
Marshall  College  in  order  to  avoid  the  work  of  an  exami- 
nation. It  happened  that  he  was  born  and  reared  in 
Pike  County,  Missouri,  so  when  he  examined  my  creden- 
tials he  advised  me  not  to  accept  the  Renick  school  at 
fifty-five  dollars  a  month,  as  Judge  Orr  was  up  the  day 
before  from  Louisiana,  Pike  County,  Missouri,  and  had 
told  him  that  Professor  Osborn  had  resigned  an  eighteen- 
hundred-dollar  position  in  the  public  school  at  Louisiana 
to  be  president  of  the  Warrensburg  Normal  School.  He 
said  if  I  would  go  down  there  and  apply  for  the  place  I 
would  probably  get  it. 

I  studied  the  matter  over,  but  did  not  have  money 
enough  to  pay  my  car  fare.  I  asked  the  old  lady  with 
whom  I  was  boarding  what  lawyer's  office  was  closest  to 
her  house.  She  said  there  was  a  young  man  by  the  name 
of  Sam  Priest,  city  attorney,  whose  office  was  a  few  blocks 
away.  I  walked  into  his  office,  told  him  who  I  was  and 
what  I  desired  to  do,  and  that  I  wanted  to  borrow  ten 
dollars  on  my  face.  He  said  that  he  didn't  have  very 
much  money,  but  that  he  would  let  me  have  it,  which  he 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  113 

did.  He  is  one  of  the  best  lawyers  in  St.  Louis  or  any- 
where else  now,  with  a  princely  income.  He  is  the  first 
man — but  by  no  means  the  last  man — that  I  ever  bor- 
rowed a  dollar  from  west  of  the  Mississippi.  I  went  to 
Louisiana,  applied  for  the  superintendency  of  the  city 
school,  and  there  was  a  dead  tie  for  three  days  between 
me  and  Prof.  J.  M.  White,  who  had  been  second  under 
Professor  Osborn.  At  last  they  compromised  the  matter 
by  giving  him  the  superintendency  and  me  the  place 
which  he  had  held,  cutting  three  hundred  dollars  off  his 
salary  and  giving  it  to  me,  which  raised  mine  to  one 
hundred  dollars  a  month.  I  taught  school  a  year  and 
then  started  to  practise  law. 

Pike  County  is  one  of  the  largest,  richest,  and  most 
beautiful  counties  in  the  world,  and  if  I  had  searched  the 
country  over  to  find  a  county  which  had  a  surplus  of  good 
lawyers — some  of  them  great  lawyers — and  where  it  would 
have  been  most  difficult  for  a  young  lawyer  to  get  a  start, 
I  could  not  possibly  have  struck  one  that  exceeded  Pike 
County.  It  had  a  population  of  about  twenty-eight 
thousand  people,  and  at  that  time  there  were  sixty-seven 
licensed  lawyers  in  the  county — about  forty  of  them  try- 
ing to  make  a  living  practising  law.  Among  them  were 
one  ex-judge  of  the  Supreme  Court,  two  ex-Congressmen, 
two  ex-circuit  judges,  a  man  who  was  afterward  circuit 
judge,  another  who  was  afterward  judge  of  the  Court  of 
Appeals,  another  who  was  afterward  state  senator,  another 
who  became  both  state  senator  and  lieutenant-governor, 
and  one  who  was  United  States  district  attorney  and  is 
now  a  Federal  judge.  In  addition  to  these  were  several 
splendid  lawyers  who  never  held  any  political  office.  It 
was  very  hard  sledding  for  me,  so  much  so  that  I  got  out 
of  money  entirely  and  bought  a  newspaper  on  credit, 
ran  it  for  one  year,  made  twenty-two  hundred  dollars, 
and  then  sold  it  to  the  man  I  bought  it  from  for  seven 
hundred  dollars  more  than  I  gave  for  it. 

Vol.  I.— 8 


114   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

I  regard  the  experiences  of  that  year  as  among  the  most 
valuable  in  my  life.  I  was  elected  city  attorney  and  re- 
elected. I  grew  weary  of  that  office  and  resigned  it.  I 
lived  in  Louisiana,  which  is  the  largest  town  in  the  county 
and  situated  on  the  Mississippi,  five  years.  Then  in  1880 1 
moved  to  the  county-seat.  Bowling  Green,  where  I  Hve  now. 

I  am  not  certain  that  I  ever  would  have  got  a  start 
practising  law  in  Pike  County  if  it  had  not  been  for  an 
accident.  One  man  killed  another  and  the  two  opposing 
candidates  for  prosecuting  attorney  volunteered  to  defend 
him,  which,  of  course,  disqualified  the  one  who  was  elected 
from  prosecuting  in  the  Circuit  Court,  and  the  circuit 
judge  appointed  me  to  prosecute.  I  had  nothing  else  to 
do,  so  I  studied  that  case  as  thoroughly  as  I  ever  studied 
any  case  in  my  life,  and  did  what  a  lawyer  very  rarely 
can  do — that  is,  wrote  my  closing  speech  and  committed 
it  to  memory.  The  accused  had  been  out  on  three  hun- 
dred dollars'  bail.  To  the  surprise  of  everybody,  I  secured 
a  verdict  to  hang  him.  The  Supreme  Court  set  aside 
the  verdict  because  the  Circuit  Court  permitted  the  jury 
to  separate.  Then  the  lawyers  for  the  defense  proposed 
that  he  should  plead  guilty  to  murder  in  the  second 
degree  and  take  a  twenty-five  years'  sentence,  and  the 
presiding  judge  persuaded  me  to  agree  to  it.  He  went 
to  the  penitentiary  and  died  there. 

That  case  laid  the  foundation  of  my  fortunes  as  a 
lawyer.  One  of  the  annoying  features  of  it,  however, 
was  that  it  took  me  nearly  twenty  years  to  make  any- 
body beheve  that  I  ever  made  as  good  a  speech  in  that 
old  court-house  as  I  did  in  that  particular  case. 

I  was  city  attorney  for  Bowling  Green.  I  resigned  that 
office  also.  So  I  have  two  resignations  to  my  credit,  not- 
withstanding Jefferson's  famous  dictum.  Then  I  was 
assistant  county  attorney  four  years,  county  attorney 
four  years,  presidential  elector  on  the  Hancock  and  Eng- 
lish ticket,  and  was  elected  to  the  Legislature  in  1888..^ 


r. 


V 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  115 

In  addition,  I  was  author  of  the  Missouri  Australian- 
ballot  law,  and  of  Missouri's  anti-trust  statute,  which 
has  been  attacked  in  every  court,  and  finally  sustained 
by  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States.  By  enforc- 
ing my  statute  two  attorneys-general  of  Missouri  built 
up  reputations  enough  to  Hft  themselves  into  the  guber- 
natorial chair.  Under  my  statute  more  than  a  million 
dollars  in  fines  have  been  paid  into  the  treasury  of  Mis- 
souri, and  several  trusts  have  been  driven  from  the  state. 

I  was  chairman  of  a  legislative  committee  to  investi- 
gate the  University  of  Missouri,  which  made  of  that 
institution  a  university  in  fact  as  well  as  in  name,  placing 
it  in  the  front  rank. 

My  experience  as  a  lawyer  has  been  the  ordinary  expe- 
rience of  an  active  country  lawyer  practising  both  civil 
and  criminal  law,  with  a  strong  penchant  for  politics.  I 
stumped  the  county  and  the  surrounding  counties,  later 
the  state,  and  finally  the  country  generally  during  every 
campaign,  whether  I  was  a  candidate  or  not.  Some  of 
the  hardest  fights  I  ever  made  inside  of  a  court-house 
were  made  without  fee  or  hope  of  reward  to  save  from  the 
penitentiary  or  the  gallows  some  poor  wretch  who  could 
not  pay  a  cent,  or  to  help  some  poor  man  or  woman 
secure  their  rights  in  civil  suits. 

In  Missouri,  while  the  trial  court  has  a  right  to  appoint 
a  lawyer  to  defend  somebody,  it  has  no  power  to  have 
the  lawyer  paid  anything;  so  a  sensible,  right-thinking 
judge  distributes  what  may  be  called  charity  cases  among 
the  lawyers,  especially  the  young  lawyers.  I  never  re- 
fused in  my  fife  to  defend  anybody  charged  with  crime 
when  I  was  appointed  to  do  so. 

One  of  the  most  peculiar  and  interesting  civil  cases  I 
was  ever  engaged  in  involved  twelve  hundred  acres  of 
land,  worth  about  sixty-five  thousand  dollars  then;  worth 
twice  that  amount  now.  There  is  no  richer  land  under 
.he  sun  ;h^n  in  Pike  County,  Missouri,    Like  Zion 


ii6   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

of  old,  it  is  beautiful  for  situation.  Thomas  F. 
Marshall,  the  most  brilliant  of  all  Kentucky  orators — 
which  is  saying  a  great  deal — once  denominated  Wood- 
ford County,  Kentucky,  **the  asparagus-bed  of  the  garden 
spot  of  the  world";  but  it  is  not  more  fertile  or  lovely 
than  Pike  County,  Missouri. 

In  territorial  days  a  young  Kentuckian  named  Uriel 
Griffith  settled  in  Pike,  and  was  soon  elected  constable. 
He  also  taught  school.  From  his  two  occupations  he 
accumulated  some  ready  money.  When  all  the  govern- 
ment land  in  northeast  Missouri  was  by  some  strange 
hocus-pocus  sold  for  twelve  and  one-half  cents  per  acre 
as  swamp-lands,  Griffith  bought  sixteen  hundred  acres — 
as  fine  soil  as  a  crow  ever  flew  over — all  heavily  wooded, 
not  an  acre  of  which  was  swamp-land,  though  so  classified 
as  such  by  Federal  government  experts.  Griffith  had 
four  children — one  daughter  and  three  sons — in  age  about 
two  years,  apart.  When  we  tried  the  case  in  issue  the 
daughter  was  sixty-five  and  the  sons  sixty-three,  sixty- 
one,  and  fifty-nine,  respectively. 

Uriel  Griffith  was  a  hard-headed  business  man,  honest 
and  full  of  prejudice. 

When  his  daughter  was  fifteen  she  married  a  man 
named  CHff'ord,  whom  Griffith  liked.  Consequently,  he 
gave  his  daughter  four  hundred  acres  of  that  rich  land, 
worth  about  five  dollars  per  acre  at  the  time  of  her 
marriage. 

In  Missouri  an  "advancement"  bears  no  interest — a 
fact  which  caused  the  lawsuit. 

The  land  was  worth  five  dollars  per  acre  on  her  wedding- 
day.  She  still  owned  it  when  we  tried  the  case,  but  it 
was  then  worth  at  least  fifty  dollars  per  acre.  It  is  now 
worth  from  one  hundred  dollars  to  one  hundred  and  fifty. 
As  his  sons  became  of  age,  distrusting  their  business 
capacity,  Griffith  did  not  give  them  farms,  but  said  to 
each  of  them,  "Son,  you  go  and  clear  up  such  and  such 


Photo  by  bruuii  i>rua. 


TWO   VIEWS   OF   CHAMP   CLARK  S    BIRTHPLACE    IN   KENTUCKY 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  117 

a  four-hundred-acre  tract,  and  when  you  show  that  you 
have  sense  enough  to  attend  to  your  own  business  I  will 
deed  it  to  you."  So  the  sons  cleared  off  the  heavy  timber, 
converted  the  forest-land  into  splendid  farms,  built  com- 
fortable houses  and  reared  families — some  having  grand- 
children. 

From  time  to  time  Griffith  gave  his  daughter  and  sons 
each  about  the  same  quantity  of  personal  property. 

So  things  ran  along  till  1883,  when  he  had  attained  the 
great  age  of  ninety-three  years.  He  called  in  three  of 
his  most  prominent  neighbors,  and  had  them  divide  what 
was  left  of  his  personal  property  equally  among  his  four 
children,  each  receiving  about  twenty-five  thousand  dol- 
lars. Then  he  deeded  the  three  farms  of  four  hundred 
acres  each  to  his  three  sons — the  farms  which  they  had 
carved  out  of  the  virgin  forest,  and  on  which  they  had 
lived  for  twoscore  years.  The  land  which  the  sons  re- 
ceived was  the  same  quantity  for  each,  and  of  the  same 
quality  as  that  which  their  sister  had  received  a  half-cen- 
tury before,  but  it  was  worth  fifty  dollars  per  acre  when 
they  got  their  deeds. 

Uriel  Grifiith  reserved  to  himself  only  a  pony,  boasting, 
after  the  division  of  the  property  and  the  delivery  of  the 
deeds,  that  he  had  fixed  it  so  that  "neither  the  Probate 
Court  nor  the  damned  lawyers  would  get  any  of  my 
money" — in  which  remark  Uncle  Uriel  made  the  mistake 
of  his  life. 

Having  disposed  of  his  earthly  estate,  he  turned  his 
attention  to  the  saving  of  his  soul.  A  preacher  in  the 
Church  of  the  Disciples,  or  the  Christian  Church,  or  the 
Campbellite  Church,  as  it  is  sometimes  vulgarly  called, 
waited  on  the  feeble  old  man,  persuaded  him  to  join  his 
church,  and  set  a  day  when  the  brethren  and  sisters  would 
bring  a  bathtub  and  immerse  him. 

A  Cumberland  Presbyterian  brother.  Rev.  Taylor  Ber- 
nard, desiring  to  save  such  a  prominent  citizen,  visited 


ii8   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

him,  explained  to  him  that  baptism  by  sprinkling  was 
just  as  efl&cacious  as  immersion,  and,  what  was  more,  that 
if  he  were  dipped,  in  his  weak  physical  condition,  it  might 
kill  him.  So  the  ancient  penitent,  who  in  his  long  life 
had  paid  much  more  attention  to  piling  up  the  ducats 
than  he  had  to  theological  points,  consented  to  be 
sprinkled. 

By  one  of  those  strange  and  irritating  coincidences 
which  puzzle  even  the  philosophers,  when  a  large  company 
of  Disciples,  male  and  female,  approached  the  Griffith 
residence  with  their  bathtub  to  immerse  that  aged  con- 
vert, they  met  Brother  Taylor  Bernard  with  his  company 
of  Presbyterians,  male  and  female,  departing  in  joyous 
frame  of  mind,  having  just  snatched  the  nonogenarian  as 
a  brand  from  the  burning,  by  sprinkling  him! 

When  the  triumphant  Presbyterians  gleefully  com- 
municated that  fact  to  my  brethren  and  sisters  of  the 
Disciples'  Church,  the  latter  were  astonished — even  dum- 
founded.  The  first  to  recover  power  of  speech  was  my 
cousin,  J.  W.  Beauchamp,  a  prominent  Disciple,  as  smart 
as  a  whip,  whose  daughter  had  married  Mrs.  Clifford's 
son — therefore  Uriel  Griffith's  grandson.  Swearing  being 
prohibited  to  Disciples,  my  cousin  Beauchamp  contented 
himself  with  saying,  loud  enough  for  both  Disciples  and 
Presbyterians  to  hear,  **01d  Griffith  is  as  crazy  as  a  bed- 
bug!"— not  very  chaste  language  or  classical,  but  exceed- 
ingly and  sufficiently  plain — destined  to  bear  much  fruit 
and  sadly  to  disappoint  Uncle  Griffith's  jubilant  predic- 
tion that  the  lawyers  would  get  none  of  his  money. 

Of  course,  these  unusual  transactions  created  a  great 
hubbub  in  that  splendid  rural  community.  For  many 
moons  they  were  the  resounding  theme  of  every  tongue 
for  miles  around. 

In  about  two  years  Uncle  Uriel  Griffith  departed  this 
life,  dying  in  the  Presbyterian  faith,  Brother  Taylor 
Bernard  delivering  the  funeral  sermon. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  119 

Shortly  after  his  obsequies,  his  daughter,  Mrs.  CHfFord, 
then  by  a  second  marriage  Mrs.  Bryant,  brought  suit 
against  her  three  brothers  to  set  aside  the  deeds  to  their 
fine  farms  on  the  ground  that  when  their  father,  also  her 
father,  executed  those  instruments  he  was  non  compos 
mentis.  The  battle  was  on,  and  it  was  hot  enough  to 
please  the  most  fastidious. 

At  the  trial,  one  hundred  and  fifty-two  of  the  best  men 
and  women  in  the  community  testified.  All  who  believed 
in  baptism  by  immersion  swore  that  Griffith  was  crazy, 
and  all  who  believed  in  baptism  by  sprinkling  or  pouring 
swore  that  his  mind  was  clear  as  a  bell.  AH  swore 
honestly.  The  jury  stood  eleven  for  the  defendants — 
one  for  the  plaintiff. 

At  the  next  term  of  the  court  we  tried  the  case  again 
with  the  same  cast  of  characters — the  same  judge,  the 
same  lawyers,  the  same  witnesses,  the  same  instructions, 
and  the  same  speeches  as  nearly  as  we  could  reproduce 
them  from  memory.  Nothing  had  changed  except  the 
religious  persuasion  of  the  jurors.  They  stood  five  for 
the  plaintiff,  seven  for  the  defendants. 

Six  months  later  we  tried  the  case  a  third  time  under 
precisely  the  same  conditions.  The  opinions  of  the  jury 
as  to  sprinkling  and  dipping  had  changed  still  more  and 
the  jurors  stood  eleven  for  the  plaintiff  and  one  for  the 
defendants — the  proportion  of  jurors  in  the  first  and 
third  trials  being  precisely  reversed. 

The  accumulating  costs  were  growing  burdensome  to 
both  sides,  and  we  compromised  the  case. 

Nothing,  in  my  judgment,  influenced  the  jurors  except 
their  behef  in  the  various  modes  of  baptism. 

I  have  always  contended  that  anything  that  will  pro- 
duce a  quarrel  may  cause  a  fight,  or  even  a  killing.  A 
quarrel  about  a  penny  dropping  on  the  floor  may  lead  to 
a  murder. 

Down  in  the  southern  end  of  Pike  County,  Missouri, 


I20   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

there  lived  a  family  by  the  name  of  Show.  They  were 
pioneers,  well  connected,  and  fairly  well  educated.  Old 
man  Show  was  dead.  His  widow  had  three  grown  sons 
— ^James,  Marshall,  and  Parran — living  with  her,  together 
with  one  unmarried  daughter.  Her  oldest  son,  Morgan 
Show,  lived  about  half  a  mile  from  her  house.  He  had 
been  a  captain  in  the  regiment  of  Col.  Bill  Anderson- — 
the  celebrated  guerrilla  chief.  He  had  proved  his  cour- 
age in  many  a  hot  battle.  He  rented  an  eighty-acre 
prairie  field  to  plant  in  corn.  He  sublet  forty  acres  to 
the  three  brothers  Show.  Then  they  fell  out  about  where 
the  division-line  between  the  two  forty  acres  was.  The 
strip  in  dispute  was  about  wide  enough  for  four  corn  rows. 
For  two  or  three  weeks  they  plowed  and  harrowed  with 
rifles  and  double-barreled  shotguns  strapped  to  their 
backs,  all  inside  that  eighty-acre  field. 

One  morning,  shortly  after  daylight.  Captain  Show 
shot  his  nineteen-year-old  brother,  Parran,  in  the  back 
with  his  squirrel-rifle,  killing  him  instantly.  Hon.  Nat 
C.  Dryden,  one  of  the  most  prominent  criminal  lawyers 
in  the  state,  and  myself  were  employed  as  special  prose- 
cutors in  the  case  to  assist  the  county  attorneys.  After 
a  week's  preliminary  trial  before  the  justice  of  the  peace, 
we  bound  him  over  to  the  Circuit  Court  without  bond, 
for  murder  in  the  first  degree.  The  grand  jury  indicted 
him  promptly.  He  took  a  change  of  venue  from  Bowling 
Green,  the  county-seat  of  Pike  County,  to  Hannibal. 
The  day  before  Judge  Porter's  term  as  circuit  judge 
expired  he  turned  Captain  Show  loose — that  is,  he  bailed 
Captain  Show  in  a  writ  of  habeas  corpus  proceedings. 
The  prosecuting  attorney,  David  A.  Ball,  afterward  state 
senator  and  Heutenant-govemor,  stated  to  Judge  Porter 
that  the  feeling  among  the  Shows  was  such  that,  while 
he  undoubtedly  had  the  legal  power  to  bail  Show,  it 
would  end  in  another  killing.  Who  was  killed  would 
depend  on  who  got  the  drop.     While  in  jail  Captain  Show 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  121 

had  stated  repeatedly  to  witnesses  about  whose  veracity 
there  was  no  question  that  all  he  wanted  to  get  out  of 
jail  for  was  to  kill  his  mother  and  the  three  brothers. 

His  case  at  Hannibal  was  set  for  Monday,  the  ninth 
day  of  January,  1882.  On  the  second  day  of  January  I 
received  a  telegram  from  Jim  Show  stating  that  Marshall 
Show  had  killed  Capt.  Morgan  Show  and  wanted  me  to 
defend  him.  It  turned  out  that  during  the  mean  time 
Capt.  Morgan  Show  had  joined  the  Holiness  Church  and 
was  very  fond  of  arguing  the  correctness  of  the  tenets  of 
that  church.  He  had  also  moved  from  Pike  County  up 
to  Audrain  County.  On  Sunday,  January  ist,  he  was 
down  in  the  neighborhood  of  his  old  home  in  Pike  County, 
summoning  witnesses.  A  man  by  the  name  of  Weather- 
ford,  who  had  married  one  of  his  sisters,  lived  on  the 
south  side  of  the  big  road  which  was  the  county  line 
between  Pike  and  Lincoln.  It  happened,  by  one  of  those 
curious  coincidences  that  confound  even  the  prophets,  that 
along  about  two  or  three  o'clock  on  that  Sunday  after- 
noon Capt.  Morgan  Show  stopped  at  Weatherford*s 
home,  with  the  intention  of  staying  all  night.  While  he 
was  there,  about  four  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  Weather- 
ford  looked  out  at  the  window  and  saw  Marshall  Show 
riding  up.  It  was  afterward  proved  beyond  all  question 
that  Marshall  Show  did  not  know  that  Capt.  Morgan 
Show  was  anywhere  in  Pike  County  or  Lincoln.  Weather- 
ford  did  not  want  blood  shed  in  his  house,  so  he  went  out 
to  the  yard  fence,  met  Marshall  Show,  explained  to  him 
that  Captain  Morgan  was  in  the  house,  and  that,  while 
ordinarily  he  would  be  glad  to  welcome  him  to  his  home, 
he  did  not  want  him  to  come  in.  Marshall  Show  said 
that  he  did  not  want  any  trouble  with  Captain  Morgan, 
and  turned  his  horse  and  started  to  ride  off.  Before  he 
got  out  of  ear-shot,  however,  Mrs.  Weatherford,  the  sister 
to  both  of  them,  went  out  and  called  to  him,  and  told 
him  that  his  brother  and  her  brother,  Captain  Show, 


122   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

wanted  to  see  him  to  have  a  friendly  conversation.  Before 
she  finished  talking  to  him  Captain  Show  himself  came 
out  and  began  to  discourse  to  Marshall  in  the  strain  used 
by  the  Holiness  people,  to  the  effect  that  they  had  listened 
to  the  evil  spirits  long  enough,  that  it  was  time  they  lis- 
tened to  the  good  ones,  and  invited  him  to  get  down  and 
come  into  the  house  and  have  a  friendly  conversation. 

They  started  into  the  house  in  the  following  order: 
Weatherford  in  front,  Mrs.  Weatherford  and  her  two 
little  girls  following;  next  came  Captain  Show,  and  Mar- 
shall brought  up  the  rear.  Weatherford  walked  on 
through  the  house  to  the  wood-pile  to  get  some  wood. 
Mrs.  Weatherford  and  the  little  girls  started  through  a 
partition  door  into  another  room,  leaving  the  two  brothers 
together  in  the  front  room. 

Up  to  this  point  there  was  absolutely  no  controversy 
as  to  what  happened.  What  happened  in  the  house,  at 
least  part  of  it,  was  that  Capt.  Morgan  Show  was  shot 
in  three  places.  One  bullet  went  in  a  little  back  of  the 
median  line  on  the  left  side  between  the  fourth  and  fifth 
ribs,  counting  up,  and  came  out  under  his  left  nipple, 
lodging  between  his  two  shirts.  Another  bullet  struck 
him  in  the  right  side,  a  little  back  of  the  median  Hne, 
between  the  fifth  and  sixth  ribs,  counting  up,  and  came 
out  under  his  left  nipple,  lodging  between  his  two  shirts. 
The  third  went  into  the  side  of  his  head  and  is  there  yet. 

Mrs.  Weatherford  swore  that  just  as  she  went  through 
the  partition  door,  and  just  before  she  closed  it,  she  heard 
Captain  Show  say  that  they  might  as  well  settle  it  then 
as  any  other  time.  The  door  closed  and  she  heard  no 
more.  She  afterward  claimed  that  she  was  compelled  to 
swear  that,  and  that  as  a  matter  of  fact  Captain  Show 
stooped  over  to  pick  up  a  chair,  and  that  Marshall  shot 
him  twice,  as  described  above.  Then  Captain  Show  tried 
to  pull  her  between  him  and  Marshall,  and  tore  her  dress 
off  in  the  tussle.    He  then  fell  out  the  back  door  on  his 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  123 

face,  his  feet  resting  on  the  door-step,  and  Marshall  came 
out  and  shot  the  captain  in  the  head,  but,  before  doing 
so,  taunted  him  about  how  he  had  murdered  their  younger 
brother.  What  the  truth  was  1  do  not  know.  I  do 
know  that  she  swore  the  way  I  have  stated  in  the  first 
instance;  that  we  proved  the  threats  he  made  in  jail; 
that  we  set  up  his  general  bad  character  as  a  fighter  and 
cleared  Marshall  Show  at  the  prehminary  trial  before 
two  justices  of  the  peace,  at  Olney,  in  Lincoln  County. 
Of  course,  considering  his  character  and  his  threats,  what 
Marshall  Show  or  Jim  would  have  been  perfectly  justifi- 
able in  doing  would  have  been  to  shoot  him  in  a  public 
place  with  abundant  witnesses. 

Capt.  Morgan  Show  had  a  small  piece  cut  out  of  his 
right  eye-socket.  While  it  did  not  injure  his  vision,  it 
gave  him  a  bad  squint  in  that  eye.  I  always  supposed 
the  bullet  that  cut  that  piece  of  bone  out  went  from  the 
direction  of  his  nose  outward.  However,  I  never  in- 
quired about  it. 

In  1890,  when  I  was  making  my  first  race  for  the  nomi- 
nation for  Congress,  in  a  primary  election  in  Audrain 
County,  which  was  the  key  to  the  situation,  I  spoke  in 
school-houses  at  night  and  ranged  out  in  the  neighbor- 
hood during  the  day  to  see  voters  individually. 

One  night  I  spoke  at  a  place  called  Naler's  School- 
house.  There  was  present  a  man  named  Capt.  John  F. 
Harrison,  whom  I  had  never  seen,  but  who  took  a  great 
shine  to  me  by  reason  of  my  speech.  After  I  had  con- 
cluded he  came  up  to  me  and  said  that  I  was  going  to 
speak  in  a  school-house  in  his  district  about  four  miles 
distant  the  next  night,  and  that  if  I  would  go  home  with 
him  he  would  make  me  acquainted  and  introduce  me  to 
everybody.  He  owned  a  fine  farm  and  had  twelve  chil- 
dren living  at  home.  I  always  liked  to  visit  him  to  see 
those  twelve  children  with  mother  and  father  eating  at 
one  table. 


124   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Next  morning  we  started  out  in  a  buggy  and  he  asked 
me  how  I  electioneered.  I  said:  "I  know  very  few  peo- 
ple in  Audrain  County,  so  when  I  am  traveHng  by  myself, 
if  I  meet  a  man  I  stop  him,  or  if  he  is  working  in  his  field 
I  go  over  to  see  him,  tell  him  who  I  am,  ask  him  what 
his  name  is,  and  if  he  is  a  Democrat.  If  he  is  a  Democrat 
I  go  to  work  on  him. 

"By  the  way,"  I  continued,  "day  before  yesterda}^, 
up  north  of  Thompson,  I  ran  across  a  man  plowing  in  his 
field,  asked  him  what  his  name  was,  and  he  said  *Cross- 
wite.'  I  asked  him  if  he  was  a  Democrat.  He  said  that 
he  served  under  Bill  Anderson  during  the  war." 

Then  I  said  to  Harrison,  "I  was  employed  to  prosecute 
one  of  Bill  Anderson's  captains  for  murdering  his 
brother." 

Harrison  held  his  right  hand  up  and  said,  "You  see 
that  plug  out  of  my  little  finger?" 

"Yes,"  I  replied. 

He  said,  "The  man  that  you  were  prosecuting  for  mur- 
der is  the  man  that  shot  that  plug  out  of  my  finger." 

I  knew  then  that  I  had  found  the  man  who  had  shot 
that  piece  of  bone  out  of  Captain  Show's  eye-socket. 
I  asked  him  to  tell  me  about  it,  and  here  is  the  story  he 
told. 

He  said  that  he  and  Captain  Show  served  together  four 
years  in  the  Confederate  Army,  served  under  Bill  Ander- 
son as  long  as  he  lived,  that  Show  was  a  captain  and  he 
(Harrison)  was  first  lieutenant,  and  they  were  good 
friends.  After  the  war  closed  he  and  Show  settled  on 
adjoining  prairie  farms.  Harrison  had  a  big  wheat-field, 
Show  had  a  big  flock  of  turkeys.  The  turkeys  kept  eat- 
ing up  the  wheat.  Harrison  told  Show  that  if  he  did  not 
keep  the  turkeys  out  of  his  field  he  was  going  to  kill  them. 
One  day  he  had  on  a  long-tail  frock-coat.  Under  it  he 
had  his  army-navy.  In  his  hand  he  had  a  hatchet.  He 
went  down  to  his  wheat-field  and  found  Show's  turkeys 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  125 

eating  the  wheat.  He  chopped  a  big  gobbler  across  the 
back  and  cut  his  backbone  in  two.  The  gobbler  flopped 
over;  Harrison  wrung  his  head  off  and  threw  him  into 
the  big  road.  He  then  went  up  to  his  home,  which  was 
on  the  same  big  road,  and  began  nailing  planks  on  a 
fence,  still  having  on  his  long-tail  coat. 

Shortly  after,  Captain  Show  came  along,  saw  the  dead 
gobbler,  and  inquired  of  a  man  who  was  plowing  in  a  field 
near  by  if  he  saw  John  Harrison  down  there.  The  man 
said  that  he  did.  Show  asked  him  if  he  had  a  pistol. 
The  man  said  that  he  did  not  see  any  pistol,  but  that  he 
had  a  hatchet  instead.  Show  replied:  "Yes,  damn  him, 
that  is  what  he  killed  that  gobbler  with!  He  cut  him 
across  the  back  with  his  hatchet."  So  Harrison  said 
that  he  looked  up  after  a  while  and  saw  Show  coming, 
sitting  sideways  on  his  mare,  with  his  coat  across  his  lap 
and  his  right  hand  under  the  coat,  and  that  he  had  no 
doubt  what  he  had  in  that  right  hand.  The  fact  that 
Harrison  was  engaged  in  nailing  planks  on  the  fence,  using 
I  his  hatchet,  confirmed  the  statement  the  man  who  was 
plowing  made — that  he  did  not  see  a  pistol,  but  a  hatchet. 

Show  rode  up,  and  said,  "John,  I  have  come  up  to 
settle  that  turkey  question." 

Harrison  said,  "It  is  as  good  a  time  to  settle  it  now  as 
any,"  threw  down  his  hatchet,  and  pulled  his  army- 
navy. 

Show  rolled  off  his  mare  on  the  far  side,  pulled  her 
across  the  road,  and  made  breastworks  of  her.  Harrison 
shot  at  him  four  times.  Show  returned  the  fire  and 
finally  hit  Harrison  in  the  finger. 

Harrison  had  only  two  bullets  left.  He  made  up  his 
mind  very  suddenly  that  unless  he  got  that  mare  out  of 
the  way  Show  would  kill  him,  so  the  next  time  he  shot  he 
killed  the  mare.  It  left  Harrison  and  Show  standing 
twenty  feet  apart  in  the  big  road  face  to  face,  each  with 
an  army-navy  revolver  in  his  hand.     They  fired  simul- 


126   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

taneously.  Show  missed  and  fell  over  in  the  road  flat 
on  his  back,  apparently  dead  as  a  door-nail.  Harrison 
said  he  did  not  know  whether  Show  was  "playing  'pos- 
sum" or  whether  he  was  dead,  and,  not  proposing  to  take 
any  chances  on  it,  walked  off,  leaving  him  lying  there. 
The  doctors  were  called  and  patched  up  Captain  Show. 
The  neighbors,  not  wanting  a  feud  in  the  neighborhood, 
got  them  to  agree  that  there  should  be  no  prosecution, 
no  apologies,  no  explanations,  and  that  they  should 
resume  their  friendly  relations  where  they  had  left  off. 
Both  agreed  to  it.  Harrison  would  meet  Show,  speak  to 
him,  and  Show  would  grunt.  The  bullet  which  hit 
Captain  Show,  instead  of  going  across  his  nose  and  clip- 
ping the  piece  out  of  his  eye-socket,  had  come  from  the 
other  direction  and  clipped  the  piece  of  bone  out,  going 
into  his  head.  The  strange  part  of  it  is  that  a  navy- 
pistol  bullet,  as  large  as  the  first  joint  of  a  man's  thumb, 
could  go  in  between  the  eyeball  and  the  eye-socket  with- 
out injuring  his  vision.  This  is  the  reason  that  Captain 
Show  died  with  two  bullets  in  his  head — one  being  John 
F.  Harrison's  and  the  other  being  his  own  brother 
Marshall's. 

We  cleared  Marshall  Show  in  January,  1882.  I  had 
never  seen  him  more  than  two  or  three  times  in  my  life 
and  I  never  saw  him  again  until  the  fourth  day  of  July, 
1899,  at  Lexington,  Kentucky.  Congressman  Jonathan  P. 
DolHver,  of  Iowa,  and  myself  made  Fourth-of-July 
speeches  there  that  day.  As  I  had  attended  the  uni- 
versity there  for  more  than  three  years  and  taught  school 
for  four  or  five  years  in  three  different  counties  within  a 
radius  of  fifty  miles  of  Lexington,  a  great  many  people 
who  had  known  me  in  my  earlier  days  came  up  to  shake 
hands  with  me  after  the  speech  was  over. 

Finally  a  smooth-faced,  sober-countenanced,  clean- 
shaven man,  with  a  white  necktie,  came  up  and  shook 
bands  with  me.    He  asked  rp.e  ?!>9ut  two  ov  three  dozen 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  127 

people  who  lived  in  my  part  of  the  country.  I  kept  tell- 
ing him  about  them. 

Finally  he  said,  "I  don't  believe  you  know  me." 

"No,  I  do  not,"  I  answered. 

He  said,  "I  paid  you  two  hundred  dollars  in  silver  once 
for  defending  me  before  a  justice  of  the  peace  in  Lincoln 
County  for  kiUing  my  own  brother." 

I  asked,  "What  are  you  doing  here?" 

He  replied,  "I  am  attending  Bible  College  in  Kentucky 
University." 

It  surprised  me  so  that  I  blurted  out,  "What  the  devil 
are  you  attending  the  Bible  College  for?" 

He  took  my  breath  away  when  he  said,  "To  prepare 
myself  for  the  ministry!" 

Of  course  I  knew  that  it  was  Marshall  Show,  as  he  was 
the  only  man  at  that  time  whom  I  had  ever  helped  acquit 
for  killing  his  own  brother.  He  pursued  his  studies  and 
began  as  a  minister  of  the  gospel  in  the  Church  of  the 
Disciples,  or  the  Campbellite  Church.  He  was  a  very 
successful  preacher.  About  two  years  ago  he  died  in 
the  odor  of  sanctity.  Two  ministers  preached  his  funeral 
sermon  and  four  acted  as  pall-bearers.  I  hope  he  has 
gone  to  heaven. 

Here  is  another  lawsuit  out  of  the  ordinary  in  which 
I  was  one  of  something  like  a  dozen  lawyers  for  the 
defense — that  is,  there  were  that  many  in  the  beginning, 
but  they  gradually  fell  off  until  there  were  only  two  or 
three  of  us  in  at  the  finish. 

When  Grover  Cleveland  was  elected  the  first  time  the 
Democrats  all  over  the  land,  to  use  a  Western  expression, 
"put  the  big  pot  in  the  little  one,"  and  celebrated  in 
every  conceivable  way — ^with  speeches,  banners,  proces- 
sions, bonfires,  music,  instrumental  and  vocal,  with  Ro- 
man candles,  sky-rockets,  cannon,  and  explosives  of  every 
sort.  At  Mexico,  Missouri — a  fine,  ambitious  little  city, 
the  capital  of  the  strongly  Democratic  county  of  Audrain 


128   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

— they  had  a  tremendous  demonstration.  The  faithful 
were  there  by  the  thousands,  enthusiastic,  noisy,  jubilant. 
Organized  companies  converged  on  Mexico  from  every 
town,  village,  and  hamlet  in  the  county — in  buggies,  car- 
riages, spring-wagons,  and  jolt-wagons,  horseback,  on 
bicycles,  and  on  foot.  The  Democrats,  after  wandering 
in  the  wilderness  for  a  quarter  of  a  century,  had  come 
into  their  own  again.     So  "let  joy  be  unconfined." 

In  Mexico,  as  in  most  prairie  cities  and  towns,  the 
court-house  is  in  a  "public  square"  around  which  cluster 
the  business  houses.  In  and  about  the  public  square  the 
celebration  was  held.  The  Ringo  Hotel,  a  fine  old  hos- 
telry, stood  across  the  street  and  opposite  the  southeast 
corner  of  the  public  square.  The  fireworks  committee, 
consisting  of  four  prominent  citizens  and,  of  course, 
Democrats,  occupied  the  second-story  east  veranda  of  the 
Ringo.  They  placed  their  combustibles  next  to  a  win- 
dow in  an  adjoining  room,  leaving  the  window  open. 
They  had  a  small  bunch  of  sky-rockets  on  the  veranda 
outside  of  and  just  under  the  window.  While  the  jollifi- 
cation was  at  its  height,  in  some  way  never  clearly  ex- 
plained the  small  bunch  of  rockets,  etc.,  on  the  veranda 
accidentally  exploded,  communicating  the  fire  to  the 
larger  quantity  inside  the  window,  so  that  for  a  minute 
or  two  the  air  was  full  of  exploding  sky-rockets,  Roman 
candles,  and  other  contraptions  of  a  similar  kind.  It  was 
a  remarkable  and  terrifying  display  of  pyrotechnics,  as 
the  streets  for  blocks  were  crowded  with  men,  women, 
and  children. 

A  rocket  containing  a  pound  and  a  quarter  of  explo- 
sives went  clear  across  and  beyond  the  public  square,  and 
hit  a  splendid  young  Democrat  named  Dowell  in  the  face, 
and  not  only  destroyed  the  sight  of  one  eye,  but  broke  in 
the  bony  socket.  It  was  a  horrible  wound,  and  cast  a  dam- 
per on  the  jubilating  crowd.  Everybody  deeply  sympa- 
thized with  Dowell,  as  he  was  popular  and  widely  known. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  129 

He  sued  the  fireworks  committee  for  twenty  thousand 
dollars'  damages,  alleging  negligence.  The  case  was 
taken  to  Bowling  Green,  my  home  town,  on  change  of 
venue,  and  I  was  asked  to  join  the  numerous  Mexico 
lawyers  for  the  defense,  which  I  did. 

Among  other  things,  the  defense  set  out  that  Dowell 
was  a  part  of  the  celebration,  being  captain  of  the  Benton 
City  contingent  and  therefore  could  not  recover. 

The  case  was  fought  stubbornly,  inch  by  inch,  with  a 
resulting  "hung  jury."  All  through  the  trial  we  admitted 
that  the  sum  of  twenty  thousand  dollars  was  not  exces- 
sive if  the  plaintiff  had  cause  of  action. 

As  soon  as  that  jury  was  discharged  Dowell  filed  an 
amended  petition,  raising  his  claim  for  damages  to  fifty 
thousand  dollars. 

Before  the  next  term  of  the  court  the  Legislature  enacted 
a  law  authorizing  either  party  to  a  lawsuit  to  submit  as 
many  interrogatories  to  a  jury  as  the  court  deemed 
proper  and  pertinent.  The  plaintiff,  at  the  second  trial, 
submitted  several  such  interrogatories,  and  the  jury  re- 
ported back  all  these  interrogatories,  answered  precisely 
as  the  plaintiff  desired  and  as  everybody  expected,  but 
reported  also  that  they  could  not  agree  on  a  verdict.  The 
court  sent  them  back  to  their  room.  The  jury  in  a  short 
time  came  in  with  a  verdict  for  the  defendants !  The  verdict 
was  precisely  contrary  to  the  answers  to  the  interrogatories. 

The  plaintiff  promptly  appealed  to  the  Supreme  Court, 
alleging  that,  as  the  answers  to  the  interrogatories  led 
inevitably  to  a  verdict  for  the  plaintiff,  he  was  entitled 
to  a  judgment,  and  that  as  the  defendants  had  admitted 
that  the  claim  for  fifty  thousand  dollars  was  not  excessive, 
he  was  entitled  to  a  judgment  for  fifty  thousand  dollars — 
all  of  which  seemed  logical.  To  confess  the  truth,  I 
thought  that  that  was  precisely  what  would  happen; 
but  it  did  not.  The  Supreme  Court  aflSirmed  the  verdict 
for  the  defendants. 

Vol.  L— 9 


I30   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Then  the  good  people  of  Audrain  did  their  best  to 
recompense  Mr.  Dowell  for  his  injuries  by  electing  him 
collector  of  revenue  for  two  terms — the  best-paying  office 
within  their  gift — a  handsome  and  generous  performance. 

Rev.  Father  E.  A.  Casey  was  pastor  of  the  Catholic 
church  at  Montgomery  City.  One  of  his  parishioners,  a 
Mr.  Donovan,  was  a  big  business  man  in  St.  Louis,  who 
had  a  fine  stock-farm  near  Montgomery,  where  he  bred 
and  trained  trotting-horses  for  both  pleasure  and  profit. 

Father  Casey  was  a  big-hearted,  big-bodied  Irishman, 
jolly  as  Old  King  Cole,  very  human,  also  a  trotting-horse 
enthusiast.  He  owned  a  three-year-old  blue  roan  which 
he  named  "Mark  Twain"  in  honor  of  the  great  humorist 
and  philosopher,  and  which  colt  Father  Casey  deemed  a 
world-beater.  Every  trotting-  and  running-horse  owner 
hopes  that  his  horse  will  be  a  world-beater.  That's  the 
reason  why  so  many  horse-fanciers  go  broke.  So  Father 
Casey  was  not  pecuHar  in  his  aspirations  as  to  his  "Mark 
Twain." 

His  parishioner,  Donovan,  had  his  expert  train  "Mark 
Twain."  Father  Casey  went  to  Ireland  to  visit  his  folks, 
having  agreed  with  Donovan  that  the  latter's  men  should 
take  "Mark  Twain"  on  the  circuit  with  Donovan's 
horses  to  get  him  used  to  the  hurly-burly,  but  should 
not  put  him  into  a  race  until  they  reached  Mexico,  Mis- 
souri, a  great  horse  center,  where  he  hoped  to  sell  "Mark" 
at  a  fancy  figure.  There  was  no  dispute  as  to  the  agree- 
ment above  stated. 

After  Father  Casey  reached  Ireland,  Donovan  cabled: 
"My  horses  start  on  circuit  to-morrow.  Must  *Mark 
Twain'  go?"  Father  Casey,  with  the  prior  conditions 
and  agreements  in  mind,  answered,  "Yes."  So  the  Dono- 
van horses  and  "Mark  Twain"  started  on  the  circuit. 
Contrary  to  the  agreement,  Donovan's  manager  entered 
"Mark  Twain"  in  a  race  at  Alton,  where  he  was  defeated. 

On  the  track  of  the  fair-grounds  at  Louisiana,  Missouri, 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  131 

the  driver  was  jogging  "Mark  Twain"  around  the  track 
to  warm  him  up  when  they  met  a  sulky  drawn  by  "Fire 
Fly,"  and  driven  by  a  man  who  was  drunk  and  who  took 
the  wrong  side  of  the  track,  causing  a  coUision  in  which 
"Mark  Twain"  was  killed. 

Father  Casey  sued  Donovan,  laying  his  damages  at 
thirty-five  hundred  dollars,  alleging  that  Donovan  had 
not  lived  up  to  the  agreement  made  before  the  trip  to 
Ireland;  while  Donovan,  admitting  the  original  agree- 
ment and  conditions,  claimed  that  the  cable  correspond- 
ence made  a  new  agreement.  Father  Casey  contended 
that  his  answer  to  Donovan's  cable  harked  back  to  the 
old  agreement. 

I  was  one  of  his  lawyers.  There  were  six  trials  before 
juries,  three  of  which  failed  to  agree.  Twice  we  secured 
a  verdict  for  fifteen  hundred  dollars  and  twice  the  Court 
of  Appeals  reversed  it  and  remanded  it  for  a  new  trial. 
An  old  saying  hath  it  that  the  "third  time  is  charm." 
In  this  case  it  was  the  sixth.  We  secured  a  judgment  for 
five  hundred  dollars,  which  the  Court  of  Appeals  affirmed. 
Eleven  of  the  jury  were  for  giving  us  a  verdict  for  fifteen 
hundred  dollars,  but  one  man  said  a  priest  or  preacher 
had  no  business  with  a  trotting-horse,  and  so  they  com- 
promised on  a  smaller  amount.  In  the  mean  time  the 
costs  had  become  the  principal  bone  of  contention. 

Though  Father  Casey  gained  his  case,  it  most  effectually 
and  forever  cured  him  of  the  trotting-horse  fever,  though 
till  the  day  of  his  untimely  death  he  mourned  for  "Mark 
Twain." 

"Pride  goeth  before  a  fall"  is  an  ancient  saying.  Car- 
dinal Wolsey  who,  though  he  delivered  some  far-resound- 
ing remarks  on  that  subject,  is  by  no  means  the  only 
person  to  have  had  sad  experiences  by  way  of  illustration 
in  his  own  life  of  the  truth  of  that  proverb.  For  some 
years  after  I  began  practice  I  had  such  a  run  of  luck  in 
road  cases  that  I  concluded  that  I  was  invincible  in  that 


132   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

line  of  lawsuits;  but  I  was  destined  to  a  rude  awakening 
on  that  subject.  Road  cases  in  Missouri  are  tried  before 
the  County  Court,  composed  of  three  judges  without  a 
jury.  One  day  I  represented  the  petitioners  for  a  road 
which  a  plain,  unlettered  farmer  named  Thomas  Murphy 
was  fighting,  because  in  order  to  build  the  road  a  small 
strip  of  his  farm  would  be  condemned  for  public  use.  He 
elected  to  try  his  own  case  to  save  lawyer's  fees.  As  he 
was  not  of  the  legal  profession,  I  did  not  attempt  to  have 
the  rules  of  evidence  enforced  against  him  strictly,  and 
the  first  thing  I  knew  I  was  out  of  court.  I  have  always 
believed  that  the  court  decided  in  his  favor  as  a  joke. 
I  know  it  was  a  jolt.  I  did  not  hear  the  last  of  it  for  a 
long  time,  particularly  from  the  lawyers  whom  I  had 
before  beaten  in  road  cases.  John  Farrell,  a  witty  Irish- 
man, who  was  both  lawyer  and  editor,  wrote  up  the  case 
in  a  racy  manner  and  nominated  Murphy  for  attorney- 
general  on  the  strength  of  his  victory  over  me.  Subse- 
quently, if  a  layman  undertook  to  try  his  own  case, 
wherein  I  was  on  the  other  side,  I  insisted  on  the  rules  of 
evidence  being  enforced  on  the  principle  that  "a  burnt 
child  dreads  the  fire." 

Here  is  a  case  which  would  have  irritated  a  wooden 
Indian  or  a  graven  image.  During  my  incumbency  in 
the  ofliice  of  prosecuting  attorney  a  justice  of  the  peace 
at  the  Httle  city  of  Frankford  notified  me  that  he  had  had 
a  man  named  ProkofF  arrested  for  arson,  and  asking  that 
I  come  up  at  once  to  conduct  the  preliminary  examina- 
tion. Arriving,  I  found  Frankford  in  a  great  uproar,  be- 
cause on  the  previous  night  almost  every  business  house 
in  town  was  burned.  It  was  alleged  that  ProkoflF,  who 
had  owned  a  small  shoe-store,  had,  in  order  to  collect  in- 
surance money,  set  fire  to  his  own  shop,  and  the  fire 
spread,  thereby  destroying  many  houses  and  much  prop- 
erty. Feeling  ran  strong  against  the  prisoner,  and,  after 
hearing  the  evidenge— pnly  the  state's  ^ide,  the  defendant 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  133 

offering  none — the  justice  held  him  for  the  grand  jury, 
fixing  bail  at  fifteen  hundred  dollars,  which  ProkoflF  could 
not  give,  being  a  new-comer  and  a  comparative  stranger 
in  the  community.  So  to  jail  he  went.  Shortly  he  pro- 
cured an  attorney  who  applied  to  the  Probate  Court  for 
a  writ  of  habeas  corpus  on  the  ground  that  the  amount 
of  the  bail  bond  was  excessive,  but  I  swung  onto  him 
and  the  court  denied  the  writ,  declaring  that  the  evidence 
was  strong  enough  to  warrant  such  action,  and  that,  con- 
sidering the  gravity  of  the  offense  charged,  the  bail  was 
not  excessive.     All  this  was  in  the  natural  order  of  things. 

Prokoff's  lawyer.  Judge  James  H.  Orr,  now  a  promi- 
nent railroad  attorney  at  Kansas  City,  was  very  shrewd. 
After  the  rage  against  Prokoff  had  subsided  somewhat 
the  judge,  taking  advantage  of  the  fact  that  two  of  the 
richest  and  most  prominent  citizens  of  the  town  were 
backing  the  prosecution,  got  up  a  bail  bond  signed  by 
men  easily  worth  two  or  three  hundred  thousand  dollars. 
A  few  of  them  knew  what  they  were  signing,  but  many  of 
them  believed  it  was  a  petition  to  have  Prokoff  released. 
Of  course  on  such  a  bond  he  was  let  out  on  bail.  When 
he  returned  to  Frankford  this  same  lawyer  met  him  at 
the  depot  with  a  brass  band  and  a  crowd  of  curious  folks 
out  for  a  lark,  who  gave  him  a  serenade. 

These  proceedings  so  changed  public  sentiment  in 
Frankford  that  when  the  grand  jury  convened  most  of 
the  witnesses  had  forgotten  essential  and  incriminating 
facts  which  they  had  glibly  sworn  to  at  the  preliminary 
trial;  the  grand  jury  failed  to  indict  Prokoff  and  he  went 
scot-free. 

I  always  insisted  that  that  brass  band  thumped  Pro- 
koff's  case  out  of  court. 

"Matches  are  made  in  heaven"  is  an  ancient  proverb 
originating  in  some  fantastic  mind  and,  like  most  other 
proverbs,  saws,  and  epigrams,  contains  about  equal  pro- 
portions of  truth  and  error,   i  Marriages  to  a  large  extent 


134   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

result  from  propinquity.     So  do  the  friendships  and  con- 
nections which  most  influence  our  hves. ; 

Shortly  after  I  quit  teaching  school  in  Louisiana  I 
hung  out  my  shingle  as  a  lawyer  in  that  delectable  little 
city  in  July,  1876.  There  lived  there  a  young  lawyer 
named  David  Alexander  Ball,  who  was  city  attorney. 
It  so  happened  that  by  accident  he  and  I  stumped  the 
county  together,  traveling  in  the  same  buggy  in  the 
Tilden-Hayes  campaign.  On  our  trip  we  agreed  to  form 
a  partnership.  He  had  little  professional  business  and 
I  had  none,  but  he  divided  his  crust  with  me,  which 
enabled  me  to  remain  in  Pike  County,  where  there  was 
a  superabundance  of  lawyers,  big,  little,  and  medium. 
We  remained  in  partnership  only  fourteen  months,  but 
practised  both  law  and  politics  in  pairs  for  years,  very 
successfully.  We  dissolved  the  partnership  because  he 
was  a  candidate  for  prosecuting  attorney,  while  I  was  a 
candidate  for  the  Legislature.  He  had  already  been  city 
attorney  and  became  prosecuting  attorney,  state  senator, 
president  of  the  state  senate,  lieutenant-governor,  dele- 
gate to  two  national  conventions,  and  came  within  a  few 
votes  of  the  nomination  for  governor.  Indeed,  he  and 
some  of  his  close  friends  claim  to  this  day  that  he  was 
nominated.  He  also  came  to  be  one  of  the  best  trial 
lawyers  in  Missouri.  He  is  now  probate  judge.  I  be- 
came city  attorney  of  both  the  cities  of  Louisiana  and 
Bowling  Green,  presidential  elector,  member  of  the  Legis- 
lature, permanent  chairman  of  the  St.  Louis  Democratic 
National  Convention  of  1904,  Representative  in  Congress, 
Speaker  of  the  House,  and  led  on  twenty-nine  ballots  at 
the  Democratic  National  Convention  of  191 2  for  Presi- 
dent, on  eight  of  which  I  received  a  majority  and  was 
clearly  entitled  to  the  nomination  as  a  matter  of  justice, 
fair  dealing,  and  precedent.  I  was  finally  defeated 
through  the  instrumentality  of  the  two-thirds  majority 
rule  invented  by  the  pro-slavery  Democrats,  a  part  of 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  135 

their  machinery  for  controlling  presidential  nominations, 
and  should  certainly  have  been  repealed  when  slavery 
was  no  more.  When  first  elected  to  Congress  I  had  a 
fine  law  practice,  and  Governor  Ball  still  has  a  large 
business. 

He  is  a  capital  stump  speaker,  and  when  on  his  first 
legs  was  the  best  hand-shaker  I  ever  saw — qualifications 
which  are  of  prime  importance  in  politics — especially  in 
country  politics. 

Ball  broke  into  the  lawyers'  big  league — to  borrow  a 
baseball  phrase — unexpectedly  as  to  both  time  and  man- 
ner. One  day  while  city  attorney  he  was  standing  on 
the  street  corner  in  conversation  with  Reuben  C.  Pew, 
high-sherifF  of  the  county,  and  William  Parker,  mayor 
of  the  city  of  Louisiana,  discussing  the  weather,  crop 
prospects,  and  other  such  thriUing  topics.  A  humble, 
ignorant  corn-field  colored  man  approached  and  in- 
quired what  he  should  do  to  another  colored  man  who 
had  robbed  him  of  his  wife.  No  three  men  betwixt  the 
two  oceans  were  more  liberal  with  advice  than  the  trio 
just  mentioned.  The  negro  had  gone  to  the  right  place 
for  a  quick  and  certain  solution  of  his  difficulties.  Mayor 
Parker,  senior  member  of  the  group,  rendered  this  fateful 
decision,  "Shoot  a  hole  in  him  that  a  dog  can  jump 
through!"  Ball  and  Pew  concurred  in  the  bloody  opinion 
of  his  honor,  the  mayor.  The  negro  departed,  while 
they  pursued  their  conversation.  They  most  probably 
would  never  have  given  another  thought  to  the  negro 
but  for  the  aftermath,  which  was  sensational  and 
astounding. 

About  an  hour  after  the  foregoing  conversation  Ball, 
sitting  with  heels  cocked  upon  the  table  in  his  office, 
reading  a  law-book,  was  interrupted  by  the  colored  man, 
who,  with  hat  in  hand,  humbly  remarked  in  a  matter-of- 
fact  way,  "Marse  Dave,  I  done  tuck  yo'  advice  an'  killed 
dat  man!" 


136   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Ball  jumped  about  five  feet  into  the  air  as  though  he 
had  been  touched  by  an  electric  wire.  As  soon  as  he 
recovered  power  of  speech  he  swore  at  that  poor  colored 
man  in  a  way  that  utterly  dumfounded  him  and  then 
summoned  Sheriff  Pew  and  Mayor  Parker  to  a  consulta- 
tion as  to  what  had  better  be  done. 

The  negro  told  his  tale,  whereupon  Sheriff  Pew,  who 
had  been  about  the  court-house  long  enough  to  pick  up 
some  law  phrases,  said:  "Dave,  aren't  we  accessories 
before  the  fact  in  this  murder?'* 

Ball  replied,  **Yes,"  with  a  doleful  countenance  and 
accent. 

Mayor  Parker  said,  "How  are  we  going  to  escape?" 

Ball,  who  had  never  tried  a  case  in  the  Circuit  Court, 
answered,  "I  will  defend  him!" 

Sheriff  Pew  snorted:  "Oh  hell!  If  you  defend  him 
they'll  hang  him  high  as  Haman,  sure  as  a  gun  is  made 
of  iron,  and  send  you  and  Parker  and  me  to  the  pen!" 

But  defend  him  Ball  did — and  what  is  more,  acquitted 
him — thereby  laying  the  foundation  of  his  fortunes  as  a 
lawyer.  When  the  jury  first  reported  they  stood  eleven 
for  murder  in  the  first  degree  and  one  for  acquittal. 
The  judge  sent  them  back  to  their  room  fo/  further  con- 
sideration. After  hours  of  wrangling  the  one  stubborn 
juryman  persuaded  the  eleven  to  join  him  in  a  verdict 
of  acquittal!  It  is  safe  to  say  that  Ball,  Parker,  and  Pew 
never  gave  another  curbstone  opinion  in  a  murder  case. 

It  will  be  remembered  that  Othello  demanded  "ocular 
proof"  before  he  would  believe  lago  in  his  charges  against 
Desdemona. 

I  once  saw  Ball  win  a  slander  case  which  I  was  helping 
try  by  introducing  "ocular  proof"  of  an  important  fact. 
A  large  man  with  an  aldermanic  abdomen,  named  Boothe, 
a  well-to-do  farmer,  had  a  small,  lean  tie-chopper,  Sam 
Barnes  by  name,  who  weighed  only  some  ninety-odd 
pounds,  arrested  for  stealing  his  meat. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  137 

Barnes  was  acquitted  and  promptly  sued  Boothe  for 
false  imprisonment  and  slander.  While  Boothe  was  on 
the  witness-stand  Ball  asked,  "Why  did  you  conclude 
that  Barnes  stole  your  meat?" 

Boothe  replied,  "Because  he  was  the  only  man  in  the 
neighborhood  small  enough  to  get  through  the  hole 
through  which  the  thief  entered." 

"How  big  was  that  hole?"  inquired  Ball. 

"Sixteen  inches  by  eight  inches,"  responded  Boothe. 

"Is  that  the  only  reason  why  you  suspected  Barnes?" 
asked  Ball. 

"Yes,"  said  Boothe. 

Truth  to  tell,  it  seemed  to  those  listening  that  Barnes 
was  the  only  man  in  the  court-room  who  could  squeeze 
through  a  hole  of  the  dimensions  stated,  and  Boothe's 
evidence  had  a  visibly  favorable  effect. 

Just  at  that  juncture,  however,  there  sat  within  the 
bar,  goggling  about,  a  carpenter  named  Ike  Newton,  who 
liked  to  associate  with  lawyers  and  to  watch  court  pro- 
ceedings. He  whispered  to  Ball,  "Any  man  in  this  room 
can  get  through  that  hole." 

"How  do  you  know?"  Ball  whispered  back. 

"Oh!"  said  Ike,  "I  have  been  building  houses  all  my 
life  and  know  all  about  measuring  things." 

"How  can  I  prove  it?"  Ball  anxiously  inquired. 

Newton  said,  "Keep  Boothe  on  the  witness-stand  ten 
minutes  and  I  will  show  you." 

So  Ball  kept  on  spinning  out  his  cross-examination  of 
Boothe  until  Newton  returned  with  a  frame  sixteen  by 
eight  inches  under  his  coat.  Handing  it  to  Ball,  he  said 
to  him  sotto  voce: 

"Make  Boothe  stand  up  and  slip  this  frame  over  him." 

So  Ball  asked  Boothe,  who  tipped  the  scales  at  two 
hundred  and  twenty-five  pounds,  to  stand  up.  Neither 
Boothe  nor  the  court  nor  the  jury  nor  the  bystanders 
knew  what  Ball  was  up  to.     So  Boothe  stood  up  and 


138   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

quick  as  a  flash  Ball  slipped  the  frame  over  his  head 
and  pressed  it  clear  down  to  the  floor.  When  it  struck 
Boothe's  capon-lined,  protruding  paunch  it  had  to  be 
pushed  somewhat,  but  down  it  went — to  the  chagrin  of 
Boothe  and  the  merriment  of  all  others  present.  Then 
Ball  asked  the  foreman  of  the  jury.  Judge  Marion  Rhea, 
who  stood  six  feet  two  to  stand  up  and  put  the  frame 
over  his  head,  and  it  descended  to  the  floor  easily. 

Boothe's  cake  was  dough,  and  Ball  secured  a  verdict 
against  him  for  a  substantial  sum. 

When  I  began  to  practise  law  Judge  Gilchrist  Porter 
was  the  presiding  judge.  He  was  a  Virginia  gentleman 
of  the  old  school — a  handsome,  portly  man  of  courtly 
manners  and  of  profound  legal  learning,  particularly 
well  grounded  in  the  common  law.  He  had  been  circuit 
attorney,  member  of  the  Legislature,  and  for  two  terms 
a  Representative  in  Congress.  He  was  an  enormous 
eater  and  author  of  a  widely  quoted  saying  that  "a  tur- 
key is  too  much  for  one  man,  but  not  enough  for  two." 
He  was  particularly  kind  to  young  lawyers.  Shortly 
after  George  W.  Anderson,  a  man  of  great  parts,  who  was 
a  colonel  in  the  Union  Army,  and  who  finally  achieved 
a  seat  in  Congress,  entered  upon  the  practice,  he  was 
about  to  be  put  out  of  court  on  the  pleadings. 

Judge  Porter  endeavored  to  help  him  by  saying:  "Mr. 
Anderson,  are  you  *  taken  by  surprise'?"  which  is  a  tech- 
nical phrase;  but  he,  not  being  up  in  the  technicalities, 
and  thinking  that  the  court  used  it  in  the  popular  sense, 
exclaimed  with  much  fervor:  "Good  God,  your  Honor, 
I  am  not  only  surprised,  I  am  utterly  astounded!"  and 
so  was  the  court. 

In  the  very  nature  of  things  and  from  the  necessities 
of  the  case,  a  lawyer  in  general  practice  is  brought  into 
contact  with  much  human  misery.  My  judgment  is  that 
if  all  lawyers  would  endeavor  to  reconcile  disgruntled 
husbands  and  wives,  even  when  consulted  about  divorce 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  139 

proceedings,  within  a  decade  our  monstrous  national 
divorce  scandal  would  be  reduced  by  one-half.  Nisi 
prius  judges,  if  so  inclined,  could  also  do  much  to  reduce  it. 

I  love  to  recall  the  conduct  of  one  such  trial  judge, 
Theodore  Brace — may  his  tribe  increase! — for  six  years 
on  the  Circuit  bench  and  for  twenty  years  a  member  of 
the  Supreme  Court  of  Missouri.  He  looked  on  divorce 
cases  with  an  unfriendly  eye.  So  one  day  in  the  Ralls 
Circuit  Court  a  buxom  young  matron  presented  herself 
for  the  purpose  of  procuring  a  divorce,  while  a  fat  widower 
waited  in  the  recorder's  office  near  by  to  secure  a  license 
to  marry  her  as  soon  as  she  was  free. 

Nobody  else  was  defending  the  suit,  her  husband  pre- 
sumably being  glad  to  be  well  rid  of  her,  but  Judge  Brace 
took  a  notion  to  defend  the  case  himself  from  the  bench. 
He  cross-examined  her  until  he  discovered  that  her  claim 
for  divorce  rested  entirely  on  the  fact  that  she  and  her 
husband  quarreled  occasionally.  When  he  was  through 
he  said,  in  kindly  accents: 

*'My  dear  woman,  my  dear,  good  wife  and  I  also 
quarrel  sometimes,  but  we  kiss  and  make  up  again.  I 
advise  you  and  your  husband  to  do  the  same.  Your 
petition  for  divorce  cannot  be  allowed,  and  is  therefore 
dismissed." 

The  buxom  young  matron  and  the  fat  old  widower 
departed  sorrowfully! 

It  goes  without  saying  that  there  are  cases  where  noth- 
ing but  a  divorce  will  suffice.  For  instance,  I  had  the 
unique  experience  of  obtaining  the  fourth  divorce  which 
one  of  my  female  clients  secured  from  the  same  man,  and 
between  their  first  and  fourth  marriages  he  had  wedded 
three  other  women.  When  one  of  them  would  die  he 
would  return  to  his  first  wife  and  persuade  her  to  marry 
him  again.  She  was  a  good  woman  and  he  was  a  thrifty, 
industrious  farmer,  and  a  good  husband  when  sober; 
but  unfortunately  he  belonged  to  what  brilHant,  eloquent 


140  MY  QQARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Tom  Marshall  denominated  "the  spreeing  gentry,"  and 
when  under  the  influence  of  spiritus  frumenti  he  acted  in 
such  cruel  manner  toward  her  as,  in  the  language  of  the 
statute,  "to  render  her  condition  intolerable." 

The  most  bitter  enemy  I  have  on  earth  is  he  whom  I 
forced  to  live  with  his  wife  three  years. 

In  the  large  cities  the  law  practice  is  divided  to  a  large 
extent  into  specialties — maritime  business,  commercial 
paper,  real  estate,  criminal  cases,  etc. — but  a  country 
lawyer  is  of  necessity  a  sort  of  "jack  of  all  trades" — or, 
more  correctly  speaking,  of  all  branches  of  the  practice. 

The  best  office  to  which  a  young  country  lawyer  can 
be  elected  is  that  of  prosecuting  attorney,  and  it  is  of 
great  importance  not  only  to  him  but  to  the  county.  It 
forces  him  into  the  pubHc  eye  as  a  lawyer,  and  if  he  dis- 
charges his  duties  well  lays  the  foundation  for  a  good 
practice. 

In  due  course  I  was  elected  for  a  term  of  two  years 
prosecuting  attorney  of  Pike  County.  That  was  in  1884, 
and  I  was  re-elected  in  1886. 

The  general  run  of  cases  which  the  prosecuting  attorney 
has  to  do  with  in  his  official  capacity  is  much  the  same 
one  year  as  another,  but  occasionally  he  must  deal  with 
one  out  of  the  usual  order. 

Like  the  poor,  we  have  with  us  always  the  prohibition, 
local  option,  and  temperance  questions,  in  some  phase  or 
other.  On  the  subject  of  local  option  I  had,  as  prose- 
cuting attorney,  an  unusually  interesting  experience.  In 
1885  the  Missouri  Legislature  passed  an  exceedingly  strin- 
gent statute,  known  as  "the  Wood  local  option  law." 
In  September,  1887,  when  my  second  term  was  about 
one-half  gone,  the  question  was  submitted  to  the  voters 
of  Pike  County,  and  local  option  was  adopted  by  a  rousing 
majority — seventeen  hundred,  as  I  remember  it.  It  was 
a  most  stringent  law  and  the  severity  of  the  penalty — a 
fine  of  three  hundred  dollars  being  the  minimum,  and  one 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  141 

year  in  jail  and  a  fine  of  five  hundred  dollars  the  maxi- 
mum —  made  it  difficult  to  enforce.  My  immediate 
predecessor,  Edward  T.  Smith,  who  was  one  of  the  best 
all-round  lawyers  I  ever  knew,  and  I  had  enforced  with 
vigor  the  Downing  dramshop  law,  with  a  minimum 
penalty  of  forty  dollars,  and  had  thereby  killed  off  the 
blind  tigers,  blind  pigs,  and  speak-easies  in  the  county. 

For  once  I  agreed  with  Senator  Marcus  A.  Hanna's 
famous  slogan,  "Let  well  enough  alone." 

But  the  people,  thinking  otherwise,  voted  for  the 
severer  law  with  great  enthusiasm.  It  was  easy  for  them 
to  vote  for  it,  but  rendered  it  harder  for  me  to  enforce  it. 

The  next  day,  however,  I  published  a  proclamation 
that  I  would  enforce  it,  just  as  I  would  on  my  oath  of 
office  enforce  any  other  criminal  statute,  and  warned  all 
persons  whatsoever  to  stand  from  under. 

The  law  applied  to  all  of  Pike  County  except  the  city 
of  Louisiana,  which  had  more  than  twenty-five  hundred 
inhabitants,  and  was,  therefore,  entitled  to  a  separate 
election.  Incidentally  it  may  be  stated  that  that  city 
remained  "wet"  until  national  prohibition  came  into 
vogue,  but  in  the  rest  of  the  county  the  saloons  were 
wiped  out  completely. 

It  is  generally  asserted  and  widely  believed  that  drug- 
gists will  not  obey  prohibition  or  local  option  laws.  One 
of  two  things  is  true,  however:  first,  either  this  unfavor- 
able judgment  on  druggists  is  erroneous  or,  second,  the 
druggists  in  Pike  County  in  1887  were  exceptionally  law- 
abiding.  They  joined  in  a  petition  to  me  to  give  them 
an  opinion,  in  writing,  as  to  what  they  could  do  and  could 
not  do  under  the  local  option  law,  pledging  themselves 
to  abide  by  my  decision  until  the  Circuit  Court  convened 
the  first  Monday  of  the  ensuing  March,  when  the  instruc- 
tions of  the  judge  would  rank  my  opinion,  and  to  their 
credit  be  it  said  they  lived  up  loyally  to  their  pledge. 

After  studying  all  the  Missouri  statutes  and  decisions 


142   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

on  the  subject  of  selling  intoxicants,  for  a  week,  I  pub- 
lished an  opinion  to  the  effect  that  under  the  local  option 
law  they  could  sell  no  intoxicants  except  the  alcohol  of 
commerce,  and  then  for  only  three  specific  purposes:  art, 
mechanical,  and  medicinal,  and  then  only  on  the  pre- 
scription of  a  regularly  Hcensed  physician.  I  added  that 
if  a  patent  medicine  contained  more  than  3  per  cent,  of 
alcohol  it  was  barred.  I  put  that  in  because,  at  that 
time,  keg  beer  contained  3  per  cent,  of  alcohol,  bock  beer 
5,  and  whisky  21^.  The  percentages  have  been  changed 
somewhat  since,  but  they  stood  at  those  figures  then. 
As  a  war  measure.  President  Wilson  reduced  the  alcohol 
in  beer  to  2j^  per  cent. 

The  druggists  refused  to  buy  proprietary  medicines 
until  the  agents  submitted  their  formulas  to  me. 

One  man  sent  me  a  bottle  of  some  brand  of  malt  extract 
to  pass  on.  1  had  no  means  of  analyzing  it,  so  I  drank 
it  and  marked  the  effect.  I  wrote  him  that  it  was  barred, 
as  it  contained  at  least  as  much  alcohol  as  bock  beer. 
Another  sent  me  a  bottle  of  "Blue  Dick"  cider,  which  I 
would  not  drink,  as,  by  observing  its  effects  on  others,  I 
knew  it  was  not  only  an  intoxicant,  but  poisonous.  So  I 
ruled  it  out  without  any  ceremony  about  it. 

One  day  I  had  been  out  in  the  country  fifteen  or  twenty 
miles  on  official  business  and  got  back  to  town  about 
sundown.  As  I  was  going  up  the  street  toward  home  a 
veteran  druggist  hailed  me  and  said,  "There  was  a 
drummer  here  to-day  and  I  ordered  three  cases  of  rock 
and  rye.    What  about  it?" 

I  answered,  "Doctor,  you  have  drunk  a  great  deal  of 
whisky  in  your  time,  and  I  have  drunk  more  than  was 
good  for  me.  If  you  were  put  on  the  witness-stand  and 
sworn  as  an  expert,  what  sort  of  a  tipple  would  you  swear 
that  rock  and  rye  is?" 

With  a  broad  grin  he  replied,  "I  would  swear  that  it  is 
a  blamed  good  tipple  I" 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  143 

I  said,  "Three  hundred  dollars  a  bottle.  Telegraph 
that  order  off,"  which  he  did. 

I  never  had  any  more  trouble  with  the  druggists  until 
the  Circuit  judge  at  the  March  term  so  modified  my 
opinion  that  "a  coach  and  four  could  be  driven  through" 
the  local  option  law — to  borrow  a  sentence  from  Daniel 
O'Connell. 

As  that  large  county  was  *'dry'*  outside  the  city  of 
Louisiana,  which  is  on  the  extreme  edge  of  the  county, 
on  the  Mississippi  River,  it  was  inevitable  that  bootleggers 
would  endeavor  to  ply  their  clandestine  trade.  I  caught 
one  and  sent  him  to  jail  for  twelve  months,  with  a  fine  of 
three  hundred  dollars.  Another  I  sent  to  jail  for  six 
months,  and  that  was  the  end  of  bootlegging  in  my 
bailiwick  while  I  was  prosecuting  attorney.  If  all  the 
rattlesnakes  in  the  county  had  had  hold  of  a  man  in  the 
public  square  during  the  last  year  and  a  half  of  my  term 
of  office,  he  could  not  have  bought  a  drop  of  whisky  in 
the  town.  He  might  have  borrowed  one  from  the  private 
jug  of  some  Good  Samaritan. 

A  week  or  two  after  the  first  offender  was  jailed  for 
twelve  months  and  fined  three  hundred  dollars  I  learned 
that  two  eminent  Kansas  City  lawyers.  Colonel  Gage  and 
Col.  Alexander  Graves,  ex-Representative  in  Congress,  had 
visited  the  jail  and  held  converse  with  the  prisoner.  I 
knew  them  both  and  they  never  even  called  upon  me.  I 
knew  what  their  visit  meant  and  who  was  back  of  them, 
furnishing  the  sinews  of  war.  I  knew  that  they  were  not 
consulting  the  culprit  for  their  health  or  happiness. 
Their  failure  to  call  upon  me  made  me  angry,  and  I  made 
up  my  mind  that  if  they  took  the  prisoner  away  from  me 
it  would  be  only  after  a  hard  fight.  If  it  had  been  a 
lawyer  from  Pike  or  the  surrounding  counties  endeavor- 
ing to  rescue  the  prisoner,  I  would  not  have  cared  very 
much,  but  I  did  not  intend,  if  I  could  help  it,  that  these 
celebrated  and  high-priced  lawyers  from  Kansas  City,  two 


144   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

hundred  miles  away,  should  interfere  with  the  adminis- 
tration of  justice  in  Pike  County.  I  concluded  at  once 
that  they  were  employed  to  test  the  local  option  law  some 
way. 

So  in  a  few  days  the  thing  which  I  expected  happened. 
I  received  notice  that  on  a  certain  day  they  would  apply 
to  the  Supreme  Court  of  Missouri  for  a  writ  of  habeas 
corpus  to  test  the  constitutionality  of  the  penalty  of  the 
law  on  three  grounds:  first,  that  it  violated  this  clause 
of  section  one  of  the  Fourteenth  Amendment  of  the  Con- 
stitution of  the  United  States — "No  state  shall  make  or 
enforce  any  law  that  denies  to  any  person  within  its  juris- 
diction the  equal  protection  of  the  laws."  Their  conten- 
tion was  that  on  one  side  of  an  imaginary  line  in  the  city 
of  Louisiana,  the  minimum  penalty  for  seUing  intoxicants 
was  a  fine  of  forty  dollars,  while  on  the  other  side  of  the 
imaginary  line  the  minimum  penalty  was  three  hundred 
dollars — all  in  the  same  county.  Second,  they  contended 
the  local  option  law  contravened  the  Seventh  Amend- 
ment to  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  which  is 
in  these  words,  "Excessive  bail  shall  not  be  required,  nor 
excessive  fines  imposed,  nor  cruel  and  unusual  punish- 
ments inflicted." 

Third,  that  it  violated  a  similar  provision  of  the  con- 
stitution of  Missouri. 

The  Supreme  Court  set  a  day  for  the  hearing,  about 
two  weeks  off.  I  had  a  set  of  Reports  of  the  Supreme 
Court  of  the  United  States  for  which  I  had  never  had 
much  use  in  my  country  practice  and  which  I  had  read 
chiefly  for  the  political  decisions  of  that  august  tribunal, 
for  many  of  its  opinions  are  of  far-reaching  and  enduring 
political  effect.  On  this  occasion,  however,  I  dug  into 
them  most  diligently  to  hold  up  my  side  of  the  case  at 
bar.  I  never  worked  so  hard  on  any  case  in  my  life,  and 
prepared  a  brief  nearly  as  big  as  the  First  Reader.  My 
blood  was  up  because  of  the  gross  discourtesy  shown  by 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  145 

my  two  eminent  and  brilliant  brethren  from  Kansas  City 
in  their  failure  to  call  upon  me. 

When  the  day  for  the  hearing  arrived  both  sides  wanted 
to  submit  the  case  on  briefs,  but  the  court  would  not  have 
it  so.  The  judges  declared  that  it  was  a  case  of  first 
impression,  in  Missouri,  and,  so  far  as  they  were  advised, 
in  the  country.  Consequently  they  wanted  to  hear  our 
arguments.  They  gave  us  an  hour  on  each  side.  Colonel 
Graves  opened  in  half  an  hour  and  Colonel  Gage  closed 
in  the  same  time.     I  had  an  hour  in  between. 

Judge  Thomas  A.  Sherwood,  who  sat  on  the  Supreme 
bench  of  Missouri  for  three  decades  and  who  was  one  of 
the  ablest  judges  ever  members  of  that  high  court,  was 
still  on  the  bench,  still  in  full  possession  of  his  splendid 
powers.  He  and  I  were  close  friends.  I  greatly  admired 
him,  but  he  indulged  in  a  habit  exceedingly  disconcerting 
to  a  young  lawyer,  unless  they  were  in  agreement  as  to 
the  case.  If  he  agreed  with  the  lawyer's  argument  he 
would,  from  the  bench,  ask  him  helpful  questions,  but  if 
he  was  against  the  lawyer's  contention  he  would  interro- 
gate him  in  such  manner  as  to  bother  him  and  weaken 
his  argument. 

Knowing  his  trend  of  thought  by  reading  many  of  his 
opinions,  I  had  reason  to  believe  and  to  fear  that  he  would 
be  against  me  in  this  particular  case,  and  the  event 
justified  and  verified  my  surmise.  I  had  not  been  speak- 
ing long  until  he  interrupted  me  with  this  question: 
"Mr.  Clark,  do  you  not  think  that  to  uphold  this  local 
option  law  would  work  confusion  worse  confounded  in 
the  laws  of  this  state  on  the  subject  of  regulating  the  sale 
of  intoxicants  ?" 

I  repHed,  "If  your  Honor  please,  it  would  not  work 
confusion.  On  the  contrary,  it  would  cure  the  confusion 
now  existing.  With  due  respect  to  the  court,  I  do  not 
believe  that  your  Honors  are  aware  that  there  are  already 

seven  laws  on  this  subject  in  the  statute-books  of  Missouri. 

VOL.   I. — 10 


146   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

But  such  is  the  fact,  which  I  did  not  know  until  I  studied 
this  case  thoroughly.  This  local  option  law  will  wipe 
them  all  out  and  take  their  place." 

I  then  cited  the  seven  statutes.  I  saw  a  broad  smile 
spread  over  the  faces  of  the  four  other  judges  and  con- 
cluded that  they  were  friendly  to  my  contention,  which 
they  were;   for  the  decision  was  four  to  one  in  my  favor. 

It  is  the  case  of  the  State  vs,  Flem  Swann,  decided  in 
1888,  and  remains  to  this  day  the  leading  case  on  that 
subject. 

That  night  I  went  to  bid  the  judges,  including  Judge 
Sherwood,  good-by.  He  taught  me  a  valuable  lesson  as 
to  arguing  cases  in  the  Supreme  Court.  When  I  entered 
his  room,  I  said:  "Judge,  I  know  you  are  against  me  in 
this  local  option  case,  but  I  thought  I  would  call  to  say 
good-by,  anyway.  I  did  not  want  to  argue  it,  as  it 
seems  to  me  that  arguing  cases  in  the  Supreme  Court  is 
a  superfluous,  if  not  an  impertinent,  performance,  be- 
cause the  judges  are  elected  for  the  reason  that  they 
know  all  the  law.'* 

He  repHed:  "You  are  mistaken.  The  entire  body  of 
the  law  may  be  compared  to  the  ocean,  while  a  particular 
case  may  be  likened  to  a  particular  route  across  the  ocean, 
and  while  the  court  may  know  more  law  than  any  lawyer 
appearing  before  it,  the  lawyer  knows  more  than  the 
court  about  his  own  particular  case.  My  advice  to  you 
is  to  argue  orally  your  cases,  especially  if  you  feel  rea- 
sonably certain  that  you  are  right  in  your  contentions." 

It  was  capital  advice  and  I  have  a  very  kindly  feeling 
for  Judge  Sherwood,  who  died  only  recently  in  the  de- 
lightful city  of  Long  Beach,  California. 

The  upshot  of  the  case  was  that  Flem  Swann  served 
seventeen  months  in  jail. 

One  of  the  most  pleasant  memories  of  my  life,  which 
will  abide  with  me  always,  is  the  fact  that  while  prose- 
cuting attorney  I  let  off  with  fines  or  jail  sentences  for 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  147 

their  first  offenses  twenty-five  young  men  whom  I  could 
have  sent  to  the  penitentiary.  Twenty-three  of  them 
made  good,  honest,  useful  citizens,  have  married  and 
reared  famiUes,  and  have  in  every  way  deported  them- 
selves as  patriotic  Americans  should  do. 

A  few  years  since  a  close  friend  to  me  was  standing  on 
the  street  corner  talking  to  one  of  those  whom  I  saved 
from  state's  prison.  I  spoke  to  them  as  I  passed  by. 
When  I  was  out  of  ear-shot  the  young  man  pointed  to 
me  and  said:  **That  man  made  a  man  out  of  meT — a 
eulogy  well  worth  treasuring. 

At  that  time  there  was  not  a  word  in  the  criminal  code 
of  Missouri  looking  toward  the  reformation  of  criminals, 
but  I  felt  that  I  had  the  confidence  of  the  people  and  that 
they  would  back  me  up  in  any  reasonable  conduct.  So 
I  concluded  to  reform  those  boys  without  any  law  au- 
thorizing it — a  somewhat  hazardous  performance.  Then 
Ohio  was  the  only  state  in  the  Union  that  had  a  parole 
law.  Missouri  has  one  now,  and  it  works  well,  so  the 
trial  judges  tell  me. 

Among  the  twenty-five,  however,  were  two  incorrigible 
thieves,  who  finally  were  sent  to  the  penitentiary.  One 
of  them,  a  very  handsome  lad  with  as  good  a  mother  as 
ever  lived,  got  to  stealing  from  his  stepfather.  That  he 
had  committed  a  felony — grand  larceny — was  clear;  but 
I  let  his  mother  and  his  lawyer.  Governor  Ball,  cry  me 
into  letting  him  off  with  a  jail  sentence  and  a  lecture. 
He  tearfully  promised  to  be  good,  but  in  a  short  time  he 
lapsed  from  the  pathway  of  honesty,  stole  his  stepfather's 
fine  gold  watch  and  chain,  and  pawned  them  for  nearly 
their  full  value.  The  old  man  was  wild  with  rage.  He 
had  evidence  in  abundance  to  send  the  lad  to  state's 
prison.  Again  I  was  soft-hearted  and  permitted  Ball 
and  the  boy's  mother  to  weep  me  into  letting  him  off  a 
second  time  with  a  jail  sentence;  but  I  explained  to  him 
with  an  emphasis  which  he  did  not  disregard  that  if  he 


148   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

committed  any  other  crime  while  I  was  prosecuting 
attorney  I  would  be  compelled  to  send  him  over  the 
road,  for  public  opinion  would  not  stand  for  more  leniency 
to  him.  He  took  me  at  my  word.  My  term  expired 
and  I  was  elected  to  the  Legislature.  While  I  was  at 
Jefferson  City  helping  to  legislate,  somebody  broke  into 
Ball's  house  and  stole  a  lot  of  things,  among  them  a  suit 
of  his  clothes.  After  my  service  in  the  Legislature,  one 
afternoon  about  dusk,  I  was  in  Ball's  law-office  at  Louisi- 
ana. We  were  consulting  about  a  case  in  which  we  were 
both  employed  when  a  heavily  veiled  woman  came  in 
and  asked  to  speak  with  him  in  his  private  office.  When 
they  came  out  he  asked  me  to  remain  in  his  office  while 
he  went  to  the  calaboose  for  a  few  moments,  after  which 
we  would  go  to  his  house  for  supper,  where  we  could 
finish  our  conversation  touching  our  case. 

When  he  came  back  and  we  started  to  his  house  he 
said,  "Did  you  recognize  that  woman?" 

I  replied:  "No,  she  was  heavily  veiled  and  it  was  too 
dark.     Who  was  she?" 

He  gave  the  name  of  the  mother  of  the  boy  previously 
referred  to. 

"What's  he  been  up  to  now?"  I  inquired.     He  replied: 

"He  burglarized  a  freight-car  and  stole  a  lot  of  things 
at  a  distant  town,  and  is  locked  up  in  the  calaboose, 
waiting  for  the  sheriff  to  come  for  him.  When  I  went 
down  to  the  calaboose  to  see  him  I  called  him  up  to  the 
window  as  it  was  growing  dark.  He  was  slow  about 
coming  to  the  window  and  had  to  be  invited  two  or  three 
times.  When  he  did  come  I  happened  to  look  at  his 
legs,  and  I'll  be  hanged  if  he  did  not  have  on  a  pair  of  my 
trousers,  which  he  stole  out  of  my  house  while  you  were 
in  the  Legislature!" 

That  was  almost  as  sad  a  case  as  where  a  counterfeiter 
was  acquitted  of  counterfeiting  by  a  certain  lawyer,  and 
paid  the  lawyer  his  f^^  in  counterfeit  money. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  149 

Washington  correspondents  declare  they  can  pick  out 
the  ex-judges  in  Congress  from  their  judicial  style  of 
speaking.  I  am  reasonably  certain  that  I  can  name  the 
ex-prosecuting  attorneys  from  the  savage  manner  in 
which  they  marshal  their  facts — as  if  for  a  conviction. 
It  is  a  habit  which  is  sometimes  as  strong  as  nature. 

The  best  illustration,  and  the  most  amusing  as  to  force 
of  habit,  is  a  story  told  of  old  Dr.  Samuel  Johnson,  the 
author  of  the  Dictionary  and  of  The  Story  of  RasselaSy 
Prince  of  Abyssinia.  It  is  said  that  the  doctor,  the 
Ursa  Major  of  English  literature,  went  to  see  a  certain 
widow  every  night  for  several  years.  A  friend  asked 
him  why  he  did  not  marry  her,  thereby  saving  himself 
the  trouble  of  constantly  calling  upon  her,  whereupon  the 
gruff  old  doctor  roared : 

**Why,  my  dear  sir,  if  I  married  her  where  would  I 
go  to  spend  my  evenings  V* 

The  office  of  prosecuting  attorney  is  an  ideal  position 
in  which  to  make  enemies,  and  to  make  them  by  doing 
right.  When  I  was  going  out  of  that  office  I  was  nomi- 
nated for  the  Legislature  with  little  opposition,  and  at  the 
general  election  ran  considerably  behind  the  ticket  on 
account  of  having  discharged  my  sworn  duty  without 
fear  or  favor.  Indeed,  I  was  in  Congress  several  years 
before  I  ceased  entirely  to  lose  votes  for  that  reason. 
Finally  it  dwindled  down  to  two  Democrats  who  would 
not  vote  for  me,  while  lots  of  Republicans  did  support 
me.  One  of  the  two  would  scratch  my  name  off  the 
primary  ticket,  though  running  without  opposition,  and 
he  would  vote  for  my  Republican  opponent  at  the  general 
election.  The  other  would  scratch  my  name  off  the  pri- 
mary ticket,  but  at  the  general  election  declined  to  vote  for 
Congressman  at  all,  being  too  stanch  a  Democrat  to  vote 
for  my  Republican  opponent.  He  simply  hated  me  so 
much  that  he  would  not  vote  for  me.  As  they  have  ceased 
to  cut  their  fantastic  capers  I  conclude  they  are  dead. 


ISO   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

If  at  the  close  of  a  long  service  as  prosecuting  attorney 
a  man  will  sit  down  and  try  to  number  o'er  the  enemies 
he  has  accumulated,  he  will  discover  that  as  many  of 
them  hate  him  because  he  had  refused  to  permit  them 
to  make  a  criminal  prosecution  the  vehicle  for  the  grati- 
fication of  private  revenge  as  because  he  had  convicted 
them  or  their  kinsfolks  or  friends. 

While  I  was  prosecuting  attorney  one  fact  was  im- 
pressed upon  my  mind  with  such  emphasis  that  I  will 
never  forget  it;  and  that  is  that  a  criminal  statute  cannot 
be  successfully  enforced  unless  it  is  indorsed  by  a  con- 
siderable preponderance  of  public  opinion  in  its  favor — 
a  fact  which  legislators  would  do  well  to  remember. 
Another  lesson  I  learned  is  that  the  best  way  to  get  rid 
of  an  undesirable  statute  is  to  enforce  it  strictly. 

Having  prosecuted  and  defended  divers  persons  ac- 
cused of  crime,  I  have  necessarily  seen  much  of  the 
seamy  side  of  Hfe,  but  it  did  not  cause  me  to  grow  either 
hard-hearted  or  pessimistic.  On  the  contrary,  I  have  a 
better  and  kindlier  feeling  for  the  human  race  than  I 
had  when  in  the  morning  of  my  life.  There  is  much  in  the 
criminal  classes  to  excite  compassion,  for  it  should  never 
be  forgotten  that  the  criminal  tendency  is  a  disease. 
There  are  thousands  of  men  and  women  in  jails  and  peni- 
tentiaries who  should  be  in  hospitals  for  persons  with 
diseased  minds. 

The  most  cruel  thing  about  criminals  is  the  cruel  and 
senseless  manner  in  which  ex-convicts  are  cold-shouldered 
or  even  persecuted  by  the  world  generally.  I  thank  God 
that  their  situation  is  growing  better,  even  if  slowly.  I 
rejoice  in  every  reformatory  feature  introduced  into  our 
laws — parole  laws,  reform  schools,  etc. 

The  old  saying,  "Once  a  criminal,  always  a  criminal," 
is  generally  but  not  always  true.  Of  course,  society  must 
be  protected  against  crime,  but  up  to  this  time  our  peni- 
tentiaries have  been  to  a  large  extent  schools  for  crime. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  151 

by  herding  young  first  offenders  with  hardened  criminals. 
We  are  more  and  more  trying  now  to  help  the  youthful 
offenders  to  better  lives. 

I  held  it  truth  with  him  who  sings 
To  one  clear  harp  in  divers  tones, 
That  men  may  rise  on  stepping-stones 

Of  their  dead  selves  to  higher  things. 

It  has  always  seemed  to  me  that  the  wisest  and  most 
human  prayer  ever  preferred  at  the  Throne  of  Grace  is: 
"Lead  us  not  into  temptation,  but  deliver  us  from  evil," 

In  the  early  days  dueling  was  much  the  vogue  in  Mis- 
souri. One  of  the  first  things  Col.  Thomas  Hart  Benton 
did  after  locating  in  that  magnificent  territory  was  to 
kill  in  a  duel  on  "Bloody  Island''  young  Charles  Lucas, 
United  States  District  Attorney.  Congressman  Pettis 
and  Major  Biddle  killed  each  other  in  a  duel,  and  many 
other  prominent  men  carried  their  quarrels  to  "the  field 
of  honor,"  among  them  Gov.  B.  Gratz  Brown,  Gov. 
Thomas  C.  Reynolds,  Gov.  John  S.  Marmaduke,  Judge 
Abiel  Leonard. 

Soon  after  Missouri  was  admitted  to  the  Union,  how- 
ever, she  enacted  the  most  stringent  laws  possible  against 
dueling.  She  made  it  a  capital  felony  to  kill  a  man  in 
a  duel  within  her  borders,  and  made  it  a  penitentiary 
offense  to  fight  a  duel  even  wherein  nobody  was  hurt — 
such  as  they  indulge  in  in  France.  Likewise  it  is  a  peni- 
tentiary offense  to  carry  a  challenge,  to  act  as  a  second, 
or  to  promote  a  duel  in  any  manner  whatsoever.  It  is 
a  penitentiary  offense  to  agree  in  Missouri  to  go  out  of 
Missouri  to  fight  a  duel.  Nevertheless  and  notwith- 
standing, there  were  a  few  old-timers  who  liked  the 
code. 

While  I  have  always  endeavored  to  be  a  law-abiding 
citizen,  and  never  had  any  desire  to  be  mixed  up  in  a 
duel,   I   unwittingly   carried   a  challenge  once.     In   the 


152   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

city  of  Louisiana,  when  I  first  settled  there,  lived  two 
editors,  Capt.  J.  C.  Jameson  and  Major  J.  F.  Downy. 
Jameson  was  one  ot  the  kindest-hearted  men  that  ever 
lived,  but  had  a  hot  temper;  he  was  an  Argonaut  in  1849, 
a  filibusterer  with  General  Walker  in  Nicaragua,  a  cap- 
tain in  the  Confederate  Army,  and  adjutant-general  of 
both  Missouri  and  Oklahoma.  He  and  Major  Downy 
had  been  conducting  a  bitter  quarrel  in  their  papers.  I 
was  on  friendly  terms  with  both,  especially  with  Jameson. 
One  day  Captain  Jameson  asked  me  to  deliver  a  sealed 
package  to  Major  Downy,  I  never  dreaming  that  it  con- 
tained a  challenge  to  mortal  combat — which  it  did.  I 
was  innocent  as  a  child  in  the  matter.  Downy  opened 
it  and  became  madder  than  a  wet  hen.  He  swore  that 
it  was  against  the  law,  and  that  he  had  a  notion  to  send 
both  Captain  Jameson  and  myself  to  the  penitentiary — 
which  was  not  a  cheerful  prospect.  I  grabbed  the  chal- 
lenge out  of  his  hand,  tore  it  to  pieces,  and  then  per- 
suaded Captain  Jameson  to  let  the  matter  drop.  From 
that  day  to  this  I  have  been  somewhat  careful  about 
carrying  sealed  packages  from  one  person  to  another 
unless  I  have  some  inkhng  of  the  contents,  particularly 
where  one  of  the  men  concerned  was  so  belligerent  as 
Captain  Jameson. 

First  look  at  that  picture  and  then  on  this: 
One  of  the  most  unique  experiences  of  my  Kentucky 
life  was  presiding,  when  about  twenty-one  years  old,  as 
a  sort  of  moderator  in  a  theological  debate  betwixt  Dr. 
D.  B.  Ray,  a  militant  Baptist,  editor  of  The  Baptist 
Battleflag,  and  Elder  Green  Anderson  Perkins,  a  popular 
preacher  in  the  Church  of  the  Disciples.  The  reason  I 
was  chosen  to  preside  was  that  I  was  the  only  person  for 
miles  around  who  could  read  Greek  except  the  debaters 
themselves.  The  question  discussed  was  not  the  mode 
of  baptism — for  they  were  thoroughly  agreed  that  immer- 
sion was  the  only  proper  method — but  upon  the  purpose 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  153 

and  effect  of  immersion.  On  these  points  they  were  wide 
apart. 

It  was  an  outdoor  performance  for  the  all-sufficient 
reason  that  there  was  not  a  house  in  the  county  which 
would  have  held  one-half  of  the  vast  concourse  of  curious 
folks  who  had  gathered  to  Hsten  to  their  champions.  It 
^^as  a  delightful  day  in  October,  in  a  fine  grove  of  ash, 
hickory,  oak,  poplar,  sugar-maple,  and  dogwood,  whose 
foilage  an  early  frost  had  glorified  in  as  many  colors  as 
were  in  Joseph's  famous  coat.  The  debate  began  at 
10  A.M.  and  ended  at  5  P.M.,  with  an  intermission  of  one 
hour  for  a  basket  dinner,  and  such  a  dinner!  Chicken, 
fried  and  baked,  ham,  boiled  and  broiled,  eggs,  salt- 
rising  bread,  fish,  quail,  coffee,  cake,  and  two  or  three 
dozen  sorts  of  pies  and  preserves.  It  makes  my  mouth 
water  even  yet  to  think  of  that  spread. 

For  six  mortal  hours  those  two  able  preachers  cut  and 
thrust  and  parried  and  mauled  each  other  in  a  terrific 
manner,  verbally.  Time  and  again  I  was  compelled  to 
call  their  excited  and  enthusiastic  partizans  to  order.  It 
was  difficult  to  keep  the  peace,  but  somehow  I  managed 
to  do  it  by  drowning  them  out  with  the  noise  I  made 
pounding  a  strong  poplar  table  with  a  hickory  club  as  a 
gavel — and  with  which  I  could  have  brained  an  ox  or  a 
mastodon.  It  was  a  ** no-decision"  contest.  I  would 
not  consent  to  act  as  chairman  until  that  point  was 
agreed  to,  for  I  would  as  lief  render  a  decision  at  a  baby 
show  as  in  a  theological  combat.  At  sundown  the  great 
crowd  dispersed,  never  to  meet  again  till  that  tremendous 
day — dies  irce — ^when  metaphysical  disquisitions  on  fine 
controverted  points  of  theology  will  be  barred,  I  fervently 
hope.     As  usual,  each  side  claimed  that  its  man  won! 

At  that  time  debating  on  religion  was  in  flower.  Alex- 
ander Campbell  debated  with  Archbishop  Purcell,  Robert 
Dale  Owen,  and  Dr.  Nathan  L.  Rice.  John  S.  Sweeney 
^nd  L.  B.  Wilkes  wrestled  with  Doctor  Ditzler,    These 


154   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

men,  to  use  ring  parlance,  were  the  theological"  top- 
notchers  of  that  era.  In  addition  to  these  great  heavy- 
weight champions,  the  land  was  full  of  smaller  preachers 
— middle-weights,  light-weights,  welter-weights,  feather- 
weights— belaboring  one  another  in  debates  which  too 
frequently  degenerated  into  unseemly  verbal  slugging- 
matches.  How  the  laymen  and  laywomen  worked  them- 
selves into  passions  about  deHcate  points  of  theology, 
every  neighborhood  being  divided  into  hostile  religious 
camps!  If,  in  my  boyhood,  I  heard  one  acrimonious 
dispute  as  to  whether  Christ  went  down  into  the  river 
Jordan  and  was  immersed,  or  whether  John  the  Baptist 
took  him  to  the  river's  edge  and  baptized  him  by  sprink- 
ling or  pouring,  I  heard  a  thousand.  Along  with  a  dozen 
or  more  others  I  participated  one  day  in  a  "corn-cutting" 
given  by  one  of  the  neighbors,  which  developed  into  a 
many-voiced  jangle  about  reUgious  tenets  to  such  an 
extent  that  the  output  of  corn-shocks  was  contracted 
and  minimized  to  what  Capt.  Richmond  Pearson  Hobson 
would  denominate  an  "irreducible  minimum."  Time 
and  again  I  heard  a  dear  old  friend — a  very  disputatious 
person — who  could  neither  read  nor  write  our  own  lan- 
guage or  any  other,  gravely  expound  the  meaning  of  the 
Greek  preposition  eis  and  of  the  Greek  verb  haptho. 

Debates  on  religious  themes  must  have  had  their  uses, 
otherwise  they  would  have  been  neither  indulged  in  nor 
tolerated. 

I  know  not  how  others  feel,  but  so  far  as  I  am  individ- 
ually concerned  I  am  glad  they  have  been  aboHshed — 
glad  that  controversial  religion  is  past  and  that  practical 
religion  is  more  and  more. 

Recalling  those  years  when  wrangling,  brawling,  and 
sometimes  fights  about  controverted  theological  dogmas 
were  in  fashion,  I  love  to  think  of  two  humble  preachers; 
one,  David  Bruner,  a  Baptist,  the  other,  Levan  Merritt, 
of  the  Disciples*  Church,  who  never  debated,  but,  follow- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  155 

ing  the  example  of  Jesus,  **went  about  doing  good," 
riding  the  hills  and  valleys  and  spreading  the  glad  tidings 
into  the  obscurest  parts.  They  were  unlettered  men, 
knew  nothing  of  rhetoric,  little  of  logic.  The  Greek  and 
Hebrew  alphabets  were  sealed  mysteries  to  them,  but  I 
never  saw  two  nobler  men,  and  they  did  a  vast  deal  of 
good.  "Brother  Merritt,"  as  everybody,  white  and 
black,  male  and  female,  old  and  young,  rich  and  poor, 
saint  and  sinner,  in  three  counties  affectionately  called 
him,  left  no  data  as  to  the  results  of  his  labors  in  the 
Lord's  vineyard;  but  some  four  or  five  years  ago  "Brother 
Davy  Bruner,"  at  the  great  age  of  nearly  a  century,  was 
interviewed  by  a  newspaper  man  at  Harrodsburg,  and 
stated  among  other  things  that  during  his  long  life  he 
had  baptized  about  five  thousand  people,  had  performed 
about  five  thousand  marriage  ceremonies,  and  had 
preached  nearly  that  many  funeral  sermons!  What  a 
record  with  which  to  appear  at  the  Judgment  Bar  in  the 
Last  Day! 

Yes,  here  in  the  Speaker's  rooms  of  the  finest  Capitol 
in  the  world,  it  is  pleasant  to  rest  for  a  moment  from 
contemplation  of  the  great  to  remember  these  two  lowly 
servants  of  the  Master,  at  whose  feet  I  sat  in  boyhood, 
and  to  rescue  their  names  from  oblivion. 

"Blessed  are  they  that  die  in  the  Lord." 


CHAPTER  VI 

William  P.  Taylor,  legislator,  hanged — I  was  nominated  for  the  Legislature 
first  by  a  grand  jury. 

OF  the  membership  of  the  Legislature  in  which  I 
served,  three  of  us,  Joseph  J.  Russell,  Robert  N. 
Bodine,  and  myself,  got  to  Congress;  and  one,  William 
P.  Taylor,  was  hanged  for  five  beastly  murders. 

The  present  Congressman,  Russell,  was  Speaker,  and 
gave  me  choice  of  committee  chairmanships.  I  chose  the 
chairmanship  on  criminal  jurisprudence  because  of  much 
practice  in  that  line.  Taylor  was  the  youngest  man  not 
only  on  my  committee,  but  the  youngest  in  the  House. 
He  was  a  good-looking,  well-set-up,  intelligent,  mild- 
mannered,  handsomely  dressed,  industrious  young  man; 
both  a  lawyer  and  banker  by  profession,  a  graduate  from 
the  University  of  Missouri.  He  was  faithful  in  attend- 
ance both  in  committee  and  the  House,  modest  in  de- 
portment, and  able  to  hoe  his  own  row.  Apparently  he 
had  as  bright  a  future  as  any  of  the  members.  Looking 
over  that  body  for  a  cold-blooded,  fivefold  murderer,  a 
physiognomist  would  have  passed  him  up,  for  none  of  us 
looked  the  part  less  than  this  young  man,  destined  to  die 
on  the  gibbet.  It  is  fortunate  for  us  poor  mortals  that 
"Heaven  from  all  creatures  hides  the  Book  of  Fate." 

When  Taylor  was  hanged,  besides  the  four  other  m- 
dictments  for  murder  and  one  for  attempted  murder, 
there  were  pending  against  him  indictments  for  forgery, 
grand  larceny,  and  arson.  Why  he,  possessing  a  good 
wife,  nice  children,  an  abundance  of  property  to  live 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  157 

comfortably  on,  with  an  assured  position  at  the  bar,  in 
society,  and  in  pohtics,  should  have  proved  to  be  such  a 
monster  of  iniquity  must  forever  remain  a  psychological 
problem  to  those  interested  in  criminology.  When  he 
entered  upon  his  criminal  career  no  man  of  his  age  in 
that  part  of  Missouri  stood  higher  or  had  brighter 
prospects  in  life.  To  say  that  the  developments  in  his 
case  utterly  astounded  all  his  acquaintances  is  to  put  it 
mildly. 

He  was  pursued  by  a  series  of  adverse  accidents  which 
is  amazing,  if  not  unparalleled. 

So  far  as  was  ever  publicly  charged,  his  first  infraction 
of  the  law  was  forgery.  A  well-to-do  farmer  of  the 
vicinity  was  very  sick.  The  doctors  said  he  must  die  in 
a  few  days.  While  upon  what  was  supposed  to  be  his 
death-bed,  the  farmer  gave  a  check  for  two  dollars  to  a 
hired  hand  for  labor.  He  presented  it  to  the  bank  of 
which  Taylor  was  cashier  and  Taylor  raised  it,  so  it  was 
charged,  to  two  thousand.  Wishing  to  give  the  farmer 
time  to  die,  he  sent  the  check  by  a  circuitous  route, 
expecting  he  would  be  dead  before  it  would  be  presented 
for  collection.  The  check  came  back  to  the  rival  bank 
on  which  it  was  drawn.  There  was  either  something  sus- 
picious about  the  appearance  of  the  check  itself  or  the 
cashier,  knowing  the  farmer's  characteristics  and  habits, 
deemed  the  check  larger  than  he  would  be  likely  to  give. 
At  any  rate,  he  sent  it  out  to  the  farmer  to  inquire  as  to 
the  facts.  The  farmer,  to  Taylor's  undoing,  being  on  the 
highroad  to  recovery,  the  opinion  of  his  physicians  to  the 
contrary  notwithstanding,  Taylor  was  promptly  indicted 
for  forgery.  The  farmer's  unexpected  recovery  was  acci- 
dent number  one,  which  led  Taylor  to  the  gallows  tree. 

Taylor  owned  a  farm  about  midway  between  Browning, 
where  he  lived,  and  Milan,  the  county-seat.  In  a  pasture 
he  had  a  lot  of  fat  steers.  Adjoining  his  pasture,  and 
separated  from  it  only  by  ^  barbed-wire  fence,  was  an- 


158   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

other  pasture  full  of  fat  steers,  both  pasture  and  steers 
being  owned  by  a  citizen  of  Milan.  On  Saturday,  so  it 
was  alleged,  Taylor  directed  a  man  named  Meeks  to  take 
a  car-load  of  steers  out  of  his  pasture,  and  also  a  car-load 
out  of  the  Milan  man's  pasture,  and  ship  them  to  Kansas 
City.  Sunday  morning  the  Milan  man  went  down  to 
his  pasture  to  salt  his  steers,  discovered  that  a  car-load 
was  missing,  hopped  on  the  train,  went  to  Kansas  City, 
and  found  his  lost  steers  in  the  pen.  Accident  number 
two  was  that,  had  Taylor  shipped  the  steers  any  other 
day  than  Saturday,  they  would  have  been  butchered  and 
in  the  freezing-rooms,  which  would  have  prevented  the 
Milan  man  from  identifying  his  cattle.  Taylor  and 
Meeks  were  indicted  jointly  for  grand  larceny. 

Taylor  owned  a  small  two-story  building  adjoining  a 
lumber-yard,  the  upper  story  being  rented  to  a  pho- 
tographer, house  and  gallery  both  fully  insured.  Taylor, 
so  it  was  claimed,  for  reasons  of  his  own,  set  fire  to  the 
house,  which  fire  burned  up  the  lumber-yard  belonging 
to  another  man — the  lumber-yard  being  what  he  wanted 
to  burn.  House  and  gallery  were  estimated  as  total  loss. 
The  photographer  had  a  fine  and  expensive  camera. 
Though  it  did  not  belong  to  Taylor,  he  was  so  greedy  that 
he  could  not  make  up  his  mind  to  see  it  burn.  Before 
setting  fire  to  the  house  he  removed  the  camera,  secreted 
it,  and  finally  shipped  it  to  St.  Louis,  where  he  sold  it. 
In  due  time  the  photographer  went  to  that  city  to  pur- 
chase a  second-hand  gallery  outfit,  and  found  his  camera 
— accident  number  three  for  Taylor.  He  was  promptly 
indicted  for  arson. 

Taylor  and  Meeks  took  a  change  of  venue  to  an  ad- 
joining county,  on  the  indictment  charging  the  larceny 
of  the  steers.  Taylor  secured  a  severance — also  a  con- 
tinuance. Then  he  told  Meeks  that  as  matters  stood 
they  were  both  headed  for  the  penitentiary,  but  that  if 
Meeks  would  plead  guilty  and  exculpate  him  he  (Taylor) 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  159 

would  see  to  it  that  his  (Meeks's)  punishment  would  be 
assessed  at  the  minimum  of  two  years,  which  by  good 
behavior  would  be  reduced  to  eighteen  months,  and  that 
he  would  support  the  family  of  Meeks  while  he  was  in 
prison  and  reward  him  handsomely.  So  the  poor  devil, 
being  friendless  and  penniless,  accepted  the  proposition, 
assumed  entire  responsibihty  for  stealing  the  steers,  and 
went  to  the  penitentiary  for  two  years. 

A  bright,  ambitious  young  lawyer,  named  Bresnahan, 
was  prosecuting  attorney  of  Sullivan  County,  in  which 
all  these  crimes  were  committed.  He  studied  the  Taylor 
cases  till  he  concluded  that  Meeks  knew  about  the  forgery 
and  arson  as  well  as  the  larceny  of  the  steers.  Conse- 
quently, he  visited  the  state's  prison  and  proposed  to 
Meeks  that  if  he  would  make  a  clean  breast  of  it  and 
testify  in  all  the  cases  against  Taylor,  he  would  have 
him  pardoned.     Meeks  agreed,  and  it  was  so  done. 

Now,  be  it  known  that  Sullivan  County  is  in  north 
Missouri,  a  comparatively  short  distance  from  Illinois. 
Be  it  also  remembered  that  a  deposition  for  the  prosecu- 
tion in  a  criminal  case  cannot  be  used  in  Missouri,  the 
constitutional  provision  being  that  "the  defendant  must 
be  confronted  by  his  accusers  face  to  face" — also  that  a 
subpoena  or  writ  of  attachment  issued  by  a  Missouri 
court  does  not  apply  outside  the  state.  Consequently, 
Taylor,  realizing  that  if  Meeks  testified  to  all  he  knew, 
he,  Taylor,  was  certain  to  be  convicted,  but  that  if  he 
could  induce  Meeks  to  leave  the  state  and  stay  out  of 
it  he  would  go  scot-free.  So,  as  court  was  approaching, 
he  made  Meeks  a  proposition  that  if  he  would  leave 
Missouri  and  stay  out  of  the  state,  he  would  convey  him, 
his  family  and  belongings,  to  Illinois,  in  a  good  two-horse 
wagon,  drawn  by  two  valuable  horses,  and  at  the  end  of 
the  journey  would  give  him  the  wagon  and  team,  together 
with  eight  hundred  dollars  in  cash.  It  is  said  that  Meeks's 
wife  and  mother  both  protested  vigorously  against  the 


i6o  MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

arrangement,  but  without  avail,  and  Meeks  accepted, 
going   blindly  to  his  doom. 

One  dark  night  Taylor  and  his  younger  brother,  George, 
loaded  Meeks,  his  wife  and  four  children,  with  their 
household  goods,  into  the  wagon,  starting  ostensibly  for 
Illinois.  When  they  reached  George  Taylor's  farm  they 
killed  with  an  ax  Meeks,  his  wife  and  three  children, 
hiding  the  bodies  in  an  old  strawstack.  They  cut  the 
fourth  child,  a  little  girl  six  years  old,  in  the  head  with  the 
ax  and,  thinking  she  was  dead,  chucked  her  with  the 
rest  into  the  strawstack. 

Next  morning  the  little  girl  crawled  out  of  the  straw- 
stack  with  her  hair  all  clotted  with  blood.  She  had  no 
idea  where  she  was.  In  sight  of  where  she  stood,  at  a 
distance  of  about  two  hundred  yards,  was  George  Taylor's 
house.  About  equidistant  in  the  opposite  direction,  also 
in  sight,  was  the  house  of  a  widow  in  no  way  related  to 
the  Taylors.  If  the  child  had  gone  to  George  Taylor's 
she  would  most  certainly  have  been  murdered  instanter. 
But,  by  a  most  marvelous  coincidence,  she  went  to  the 
widow's  house  and  said  that  her  mother,  father,  brothers, 
and  sister  were  asleep  in  the  strawstack. 

The  widow  alarmed  the  neighbors  and  the  hunt  began. 
George  Taylor  had  been  seen  early  that  morning  harrow- 
ing around  the  strawstack — evidently  to  obliterate  the 
wagon  tracks,  which  would  be  a  clue  that  he  was  mixed 
up  in  the  murders.  As  soon  as  he  learned  that  the  little 
girl  had  crawled  out  alive  he  mounted  a  fine  horse  and 
went  to  Browning  as  fast  as  the  horse  could  run,  and 
informed  his  brother  of  what  had  happened.  They  armed 
themselves  to  the  teeth,  took  what  money  they  wanted 
from  the  bank,  and  left  for  parts  unknown.  A  mob 
speedily  formed,  but  could  not  catch  them. 

Several  days  subsequently  they  stopped  in  an  out-of- 
the-way  hamlet  in  the  mountains  of  Arkansas  to  let  their 
horses  rest,  giving  it  out  that  they  were  land-buyers.     It 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  i6i 

developed  afterward  that  they  were  trying  to  get  to 
Honduras.  While  staying  in  the  hamlet  Capt.  Jerry  C. 
South,  a  young  lawyer,  ex-Lieutenant-Governor  of  Ar- 
kansas, now  chief  clerk  of  the  House  of  Representatives, 
with  the  talents  and  instincts  of  a  Vidocq,  a  Pinkerton,  or 
a  Burns,  highly  developed,  happened  to  ride  over  to  the 
hamlet  which  was  some  miles  from  his  residence.  Strangers 
were  scarce  in  that  neighborhood,  it  being  at  that  time 
far  removed  from  a  railroad.  South  saw  the  strangers 
and  observed  that  they  had  gold  watches,  two  revolvers 
each,  and  rode  magnificent  horses.  Also  that  they  wore 
Prince  Albert  coats,  with  skirts  frayed  by  briers  and 
bushes.  In  addition,  he  noted  the  fact  that  their  beards 
were  of  a  growth  of  two  or  three  weeks.  While  riding 
home  it  kept  running  through  his  mind  that  he  had 
somewhere  seen  the  pictures  of  those  men. 

Reaching  his  residence,  he  dug  into  a  pile  of  St.  Louis 
papers,  found  their  pictures,  and  also  discovered  that 
there  was  a  reward  of  five  thousand  dollars  for  their  ap- 
prehension. He  determined  to  capture  them,  but  how? 
That  was  the  rub.  If  he  went  back  to  the  hamlet  with 
his  shotgun  they  might  see  him  first  and  either  kill  him 
or  escape.  If  he  undertook  to  bag  them  with  only  a 
revolver,  it  was  a  game  of  two  to  one  in  their  favor. 
Finally  he  resolved  on  this  plan  of  action.  He  rode  back 
to  the  hamlet  armed  with  revolvers,  but  he  knew  that  the 
keeper  of  the  store  where  they  loafed  had  a  fine  double- 
barreled  shotgun  in  the  back  room.  So  he  entered  the 
store  and  found  the  Taylors  still  there.  He  asked  the 
storekeeper  for  some  article  which  was  kept  in  the  back 
room,  into  which  they  went.  Being  in,  be  told  the  mer- 
chant that  he  wanted  to  borrow  his  gun,  to  which  the 
storekeeper  was  agreeable.  Captain  South  threw  out  the 
cartridges  loaded  with  bird-shot,  slipped  in  others  charged 
with  buck-shot,  walked  back  into  the  store  with  both  bar- 
rels cocked,  and  made  prisoners  of  the  fugitive  brothers. 

Vol.  I.— 11 


i62   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

It  so  happened  that  the  state  convention,  to  which 
Captain  South  was  a  delegate,  was  to  meet  at  Little  Rock 
that  week.  He  took  the  Taylors  with  him  most  of  the 
way  by  boat  and  for  two  days  they  sat  in  the  convention 
with  him — unmanacled,  and,  as  far  as  appearances  went, 
as  free  as  any  other  men  in  that  city.  They  never  tried 
to  escape;  partly,  no  doubt,  because  on  the  boat  Captain 
South  gave  examples  of  his  marvelous  skill  of  marks- 
manship with  a  revolver  by  shooting  the  heads  off  turtles 
sunning  themselves  on  logs,  which  gave  his  prisoners  a 
wholesome  respect  for  him.  In  due  time  he  delivered 
them  to  the  Missouri  authorities  and  collected  the  reward. 
They  were  tried  before  Judge  W.  W.  Rucker,  now  and 
for  many  years  past  a  Representative  in  Congress,  and 
sentenced  to  be  hanged.  A  few  days  before  the  appointed 
time  they  broke  jail.  George  escaped  and,  so  far  as  the 
public  knows,  has  never  been  heard  of  since.  Bill  was 
recaptured  before  he  got  out  of  the  jail-yard,  and  was 
hanged  by  the  neck  till  he  was  dead. 

I  did  not  desire  to  go  to  the  Legislature  when  I  did,  and 
served  only  one  term.  I  went  by  reason  of  one  of  the 
queerest  capers  ever  cut  in  politics.  I  was  first  nominated 
by  a  grand  jury.  It  happened  thus:  I  was  closing  my 
second  and  last  term  as  prosecuting  attorney.  When  the 
grand  jury  had  finished  its  business.  Judge  John  McCune, 
foreman,  one  of  the  best  men  I  ever  knew,  said:  "Clark, 
you  should  go  to  the  Legislature.  It*s  an  important  re- 
vising session."  I  thanked  him,  but  told  him  I  could  not 
aflFord  to  go — that  after  a  long  and  hard  scuffle  I  had 
gotten  a  footing  at  the  bar,  was  building  up  a  good  prac- 
tice, and  didn't  want  to  throw  away  an  opportunity  which 
might  not  return.  He  put  it  to  the  grand  jury — ^which 
was  unanimous,  though  one  was  a  bitter  RepubHcan. 
They  paid  my  announcement  fees  and  the  primary  ratified 
their  choice.  I  spent  the  primary  election  day  hoeing  out 
my  garden. 


CHAPTER  VII 

The  Norton  and  Robinson  feud — Colonei  Hutton  got  to  Congress  by  Norton's 
and  Robinson's  delegates — The  "flip-a-dollar"  nomination  of  Norton — 
Then  came  the  Clark-and-Norton  campaign  of  six  months'  incessant  strug- 
gling, and  Clark's  nomination. 

I  DID  not  go  to  Congress  as  soon  as  I  expected  I  would 
when  I  was  plowing,  worming  tobacco,  binding  wheat, 
mauling  rails,  hoeing  corn,  and  breaking  rocks  with  a 
sledge-hammer,  down  in  Kentucky.  It  was  not  a  case 
of  **hope  deferred"  which  "maketh  the  heart  sick,"  for 
I  always  believed  that  I  would  reach  the  Congressional 
goal  some  time.  I  had  a  good,  growing  law  business 
and  was  prospering  moderately.  The  chief  reason  for  the 
delay  was  that  when  I  went  to  Missouri  I  located  in  a 
Congressional  district  where  there  were  more  Democrats 
in  the  prime  of  life  fit  to  be  Members  of  Congress — all  of 
them  older  than  I — their  ages  ranging  from  thirty  to  sixty 
— than  in  any  other  rural  Congressional  district  in  the 
United  States.  Judge  A.  H.  Buckner,  long  time  chair- 
man of  the  great  Committee  on  Banking  and  Currency, 
served  twelve  years,  the  longest  anybody  has  served  from 
the  district  except  myself.  He  and  I  are  the  only  two 
men  to  secure  more  than  two  terms  from  that  bailiwick 
so  rich  in  Congressional  timber.  He  could  have  easily 
remained  in  Congress  all  his  life,  for  he  possessed  the 
unshaken  confidence  of  his  constituents,  who  were  proud 
of  the  commanding  position  he  had  attained  in  the  House; 
but  in   1884  he  concluded  to  run  for  Governor,  which 


i64   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

opened  the  way  for  the  aspiring  youngsters  who  had  long 
coveted  his  place,  but  feared  to  shy  their  hats  into  the 
ring  against  the  veteran  statesman  who  had  led  a  high 
public  career  of  more  than  twoscore  years.  They  deemed 
him  invincible — as  he  surely  was. 

When  he  voluntarily  quit  the  Congressional  field  the 
situation  was  what  it  always  is  at  the  close  of  a  long 
service — two  generations  of  candidates  lapped  over  on 
each  other.  A  free-for-all  fight  of  great  intensity  and 
ferocity  ensued,  which,  with  four  other  fights  of  the  same 
sort,  kept  that  district  in  uproar  and  turmoil  for  a  decade. 
Wher^  I  first  reached  Congress  the  district  was  popularly 
called  "The  Bloody  Ninth."  Now  it  has  the  more  pleas- 
ing sobriquet  of  "The  Peaceful  Ninth,"  every  particle  of 
factionalism  having  "gone  where  the  woodbine  twineth." 

There  were  then  nine  counties  in  the  district.  Ten 
men  declared  themselves  candidates  for  the  Democratic 
nomination  for  Congress  and  about  a  dozen  more  of  us 
wanted  to  declare,  but  for  one  reason  or  another  did  not 
— chiefly  because  we  had  no  political  machines.  Judge 
Elijah  Robinson,  the  youngest  Circuit  judge  in  the  state, 
and  Judge  WiUiam  H.  Biggs,  subsequently  judge  of  the 
St.  Louis  Court  of  Appeals,  both  of  Pike,  settled  their 
contention  in  a  Pike  County  primary,  Robinson  winning. 
Consequently  only  nine  candidates  went  before  the  dis- 
trict convention — nine  strong,  ambitious  men,  who  fought 
for  a  seat  in  the  House  of  Representatives  as  though  it 
were  the  crown  of  the  Bourbons.  The  contest  attracted 
the  attention  of  the  state  and  wrecked  many  fortunes. 
They  had  one  of  the  old-fashioned  conventions,  where 
the  "favorite  son"  business  was  worked  for  all  that  it 
was  worth.  All  the  arts  of  old-time  poHtics  were  prac- 
tised to  the  Hmit.  They  met  in  Montgomery  City  and 
balloted  twenty-two  hundred  times  without  selecting  a 
candidate.  They  adjourned  to  meet  two  weeks  later  at 
New  London,  in  Ralls  County,  wher^  they  balloted  two 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  165 

thousand-odd  times  more.  Out  of  these  ten  candidates 
the  strongest  two  were  Judge  Elijah  Robinson,  of  Pike 
County,  now  one  of  the  leading  lawyers  in  Kansas  City, 
and  Col.  Richard  H.  Norton,  of  Lincoln  County.  They 
were  the  same  age.  They  were  two  of  the  most  success- 
ful lawyers  in  the  state?))  They  had  read  law  together  in 
the  same  office  when  they  were  lads  and  fell  out  while 
reading  law,  so  that  to  the  ordinary  political  complications 
was  added  that  of  the  personal  feud  between  these  two  very 
capable  men.  What  was  the  original  cause  of  the  mutual 
animosity  I  do  not  know,  but  whatever  it  was  it  had  much 
to  do  with  their  three  races  for  Congress  against  each  other. 
In  1884  Colonel  Norton  got  within  one  vote  of  the 
nomination,  but  he  could  not  get  the  one  vote  needful,  so, 
to  thwart  his  enemy,  Robinson,  he  threw  his  whole 
strength  to  Col.  John  E.  Hutton,  who  had  only  ten  votes 
in  the  convention,  and  nominated  him.  Hutton  was  a 
doctor,  a  lawyer,  an  editor,  and  had  been  a  colonel  of 
approved  courage  in  the  Union  Army.  In  apparel  he 
was  a  Beau  Brummell.  He  was  a  man  of  high  character 
and  Chesterfieldian  manners.  Withal,  he  was  as  proud 
as  Lucifer.  No  man  ever  expressed  his  opinions  of  men 
and  things  with  more  amazing  abandon.  He  called  a 
spade  a  spade.  If  he  thought  a  man  was  a  liar,  coward, 
or  double-dealer,  he  said  so.  Once,  just  after  the  close 
of  the  Civil  War,  when  it  was  risky  to  make  a  Democratic 
speech  in  Missouri,  the  colonel  was  making  one — a  red- 
hot  one  at  that — ^standing  in  the  judge's  stand  in  a  cer- 
tain court-house.  A  lot  of  fellows  well  "lighted  up"  in 
the  rear  of  the  room  started  toward  him,  shaking  their 
fists  and  making  loud  and  angry  threats  as  to  what  they 
would  do  to  him;  whereupon  he  stopped  his  speech, 
jumped  over  the  judge's  stand,  drew  his  revolver,  and 
invited  them  to  "come  on"!  They  stopped  suddenly, 
while  he  pocketed  his  gun,  returned  to  the  stand,  resumed 
his  speech,  and  concluded  it  without  further  interruption. 


i66   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

His  nerve  was  equal  to  his  politeness— which  is  saying  a 
great  deal. 

TTn  1886  we  went  through  the  very  same  performance, 
except  that  one  candidate  had  died,  one  had  dropped  out, 
and  a  new  one  was  added.  We  had  two  conventions, 
with  an  aggregate  of  over  four  thousand  ballots.  Judge 
Robinson  came  within  one  vote  of  getting  the  nomina- 
tion and  could  not  get  it,  so,  to  spite  his  enemy,  Norton, 
he  threw  his  strength  to  Colonel  Hutton  and  nominated 
him  again.  In  this  way  Colonel  Hutton,  who  had  no 
such  following  as  Robinson  or  Norton,  and  who  spent 
no  money  and  little  time  or  energy  in  campaigning,  served 
two  terms  in  Congres^' 

^  1888,  all  of  them  that  were  alive  ran  again,  except 
Colonel  Hutton,  with  one  new  man  added  to  the  list. 
They  had  a  deadlock  convention  at  Warrenton.  Some- 
body suggested  that  as  Norton  and  Robinson — the  two 
leading  candidates — ^were  cutting  each  other's  throats  all 
the  time,  others  being  the  beneficiaries  of  their  warfare, 
both  of  them  could  go  to  Congress  if  they  would  flip  a 
dollar  for  the  nomination,  the  one  winning  to  go  the  first 
two  terms  and  the  one  defeated  to  go  the  next  two  terms. 
So  they  flipped  the  dollar.  Colonel  Norton  won,  was 
nominated  and  elected  by  a  reduced  majority,  which  was 
not  to  his  discredit,  as  the  feeling  was  so  intense  that  any 
other  candidate  would  have  received  a  reduced  majorifj^ 

I  have  never  believed  that  a  man  has  a  right  to  run  for 
office  and  worry  himself  and  his  friends  unless  he  has  a 
fair  chance  of  succeeding,  but  in  1890  I  reasoned  it  out 
this  way.  There  was  so  much  bad  feeling  about  the  flip- 
ping of  the  dollar  and  about  the  three  long-drawn-out 
and  bitter  contests  that  I  knew  some  Democrat  would 
oppose  Colonel  Norton  for  the  nomination.  I  believed, 
however,  that  the  force  of  the  practice  of  giving  a  man 
two  terms  would  renominate  him,  but  the  man  who  ran 
against  him  and  made  a  good  showing  in   1890  would 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  167 

defeat  him  in  1892,  and  so  it  happened.  I  made  the  race 
in  1890  and  a  change  of  forty-four  votes  out  of  a  poll  of 
thirty-three  hundred  in  the  primary  in  Audrain  County, 
which  then  held  the  key  to  the  situation  absolutely, 
would  have  given  me  the  nomination  and  the  election. 
The  truth  is  I  came  nearer  beating  Colonel  Norton  than 
either  he  or  I  thought  I  would.  I  heard  that  after  it 
was  all  over  the  colonel,  who  was  endowed  with  a  keen 
sense  of  humor,  gave  some  of  his  cronies  this  account  of 
that  race:  "When  Clark  began  his  campaign  in  Audrain,'' 
he  is  reported  to  have  said,  "my  friends  wrote  me  that 
he  was  shelling  the  woods  in  the  far  reaches  of  the  county, 
but  that  I  could  remain  in  Washington  certain  of  renomi- 
nation.  In  about  a  week  later  they  wrote  me  that  he 
was  making  some  progress,  and  while  there  was  no  danger 
I  had  best  come  home  a  week  before  the  primary  and 
stump  the  county.  In  a  few  days  they  wired  me  the 
situation  was  critical  and  that  I  must  come  at  once, 
which  I  did."  After  he  was  nominated  I  supported  him 
loyally,  stumping  the  district  for  him. 

^That  campaign  illustrates  forcibly  what  personal  solici- 
tation and  a  house-to-house  campaign  will  accomplish. 
I  knew  very  few  voters  in  Audrain — none  at  all  in  the 
western  half  of  the  county.  All  the  newspapers  in  the 
county  except  one  were  for  Colonel  Norton.  So  were 
nearly  all  the  county  officials  and  politicians.  He  had 
canvassed  the  county  in  three  previous  races  and  had 
the  prestige  of  possession,  which,  according  to  an  old 
saying,  is  nine  points  of  the  law.  Not  one  man  in  ten 
in  the  county — even  among  those  supporting  me — be- 
lieved when  I  began  that  I  had  a  ghost  of  a  show  to  carry 
Audrain.  I  spoke  in  the  school-houses  at  night  and  but- 
tonholed the  voters  most  industriously  in  the  daytime^ 

To  illustrate:  Saling  township,  in  Audrain,  is  a  fine, 
rich  body  of  land  with  three  hundred  Democratic  voters, 
and  without  a  town,  big  or  little,  and  without  a  railroad. 


i68   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

It  lies  immediately  north  of  Sturgeon,  on  the  Wabash 
Railroad,  in  Boone  County,  which  is  not  in  our  Congres- 
sional district.  The  people  of  Saling,  most  of  them, 
trade  at  Sturgeon,  receive  their  mail  from  there,  and  to 
a  large  extent  support  the  town.  I  did  not  know  a  soul 
in  SaHng  township,  but  I  proposed  to  form  their  acquaint- 
ance. So  I  went  to  Sturgeon,  where  I  knew  only  three 
men.  I  asked  them  what  my  chances  were  in  Sahng. 
They  said  I  had  none.  I  inquired  why.  They  bluntly 
said  that  nobody  knew  anything  about  me,  but  they  did 
know  that  Colonel  Norton  was  in  Congress;  that  the 
rule  was  that  a  man  should  have  a  second  term,  and, 
what  was  more,  they  were  weary  of  the  constant  and 
suicidal  fighting  among  Democrats  in  the  district. 

I  inquired  if  the  good  people  of  Saling  could  be  induced 
to  attend  a  public  speaking.  The  answer  was:  "Yes. 
They  are  fond  of  that."  One  of  these  men  was  Doctor 
Keith,  who  practised  all  over  the  township.  The  second 
was  Hon.  Henry  L.  Gray,  ex-merchant  and  ex-editor,  a 
politician  of  high  degree.  The  third  was  Hon.  Thomas  S. 
Carter,  a  lawyer  of  large  practice,  especially  among  the 
Saling  people.  These  three  men — all  dead  now,  and 
whose  memory  I  fondly  cherish — sympathized  with  me. 
They  thought  1  was  on  a  fooFs  errand  and  I  am  sure 
they  felt  sorry  for  me.  They  laid  their  heads  together, 
however,  arranged  for  me  a  string  of  appointments  cov- 
ering the  township — in  school-houses-^and  made  me  an 
accurate  map,  showing  the  house  of  every  Democratic 
voter  and  memoranda  giving  names  and  minute  bio- 
graphical data.  Then  they  advised  me  to  employ  a 
liveryman  named  Joe  Palmer,  who  knew  the  people  and 
the  roads  thoroughly,  to  haul  me  over  the  township. 
Thus  equipped  and  thus  chaperoned  I  sallied  forth,  spoke 
every  night  to  fine  audiences,  and  personally  interviewed 
every  voter.  The  upshot  was  that  I  carried  that  town- 
ship by  seventy-five  majority. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  169 

A  change  of  forty-four  votes  would  have  given  me  the 
county,  the  nomination,  and  the  election.  I  have  always 
believed  that  had  not  rain-storms  kept  the  people  away 
on  two  nights  I  would  have  won,  for  that  was  the  only 
canvass  I  ever  made  in  which  I  knew  I  made  votes  every 
time  I  spoke. 

In  1892  they  cleared  the  decks  to  let  Colonel  Norton 
and  me  fight  it  out.  Colonel  Norton  was  a  man  of  com- 
manding presence,  over  six  feet,  straight  as  an  arrow, 
smart  as  a  whip,  a  good  mixer,  and  an  effective  stump 
speaker.  Moreover,  he  possessed  a  substantial  bank- 
account  and  was  not  afraid  to  draw  on  it.  Both  of  us 
were  right  in  the  prime  of  life.  He  was  a  year  and  a  half 
older  than  I.  If  they  had  combed  the  United  States  over 
for  two  young  men,  strong  beyond  the  average  physically, 
who  were  determined  to  go  to  Congress,  they  could  not 
have  selected  two  fiUing  the  bill  better  than  Colonel 
Norton  and  myself.  To  use  a  phrase  indigenous  to  Mis- 
souri, we  were  both  "strong  as  mules  and  tough  as  whit- 
leather." 

There  were  other  men  in  the  district  ambitious  for  the 
high  honor,  but  the  voters  did  not  encourage  their  aspira- 
tions. They  wanted  the  bitter  factionahsm  in  the  dis- 
trict settled  by  a  finish  fight.  This  sentiment  was  so 
pronounced  that  the  dark  horses  remained  in  their  stables 
with  such  patience  as  they  could  muster.  They  may 
have  champed  their  bits  savagely  and  pawed  the  bottom 
of  their  stalls  ferociously,  but  they  did  no  audible 
neighing. 

We  began  the  20th  of  March.  We  finished  the  31st 
of  August.  In  all  that  time  there  were  not  forty-eight 
consecutive  hours  in  which  either  of  us  could  rest.  We 
both  went  armed  to  the  teeth,  expecting  a  shooting- 
match  every  time  we  met,  but  the  very  fact  that  we  did 
expect  it,  I  think,  prevented  it. 

March  20th  we  opened  the  campaign  simultaneously^ 


170   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

but  not  together,  in  Audrain,  which  we  had  contested 
stubbornly  inch  by  inch  in  1890.  That  county  in  the 
new  district  was  not  decisive  of  the  contest,  as  it  had 
been  in  the  old,  but  its  vote  was  large  and  important. 
The  weather  was  simply  execrable.  That's  the  only 
word  that  fitly  describes  it.  I  know  not  whether  the 
three  witches  in  Macbeth  ever  met  "again,  in  thunder, 
lightning,  or  in  rain,''  but  I  do  know  that  Colonel  Norton 
and  I  began  that  campaign  in  ''thunder,  Hghtning,  and 
in  rain,"  with  snow  and  sleet  in  addition.  Not  only 
began  so,  but  continued  under  similar  conditions  for 
many  days.  The  rich,  black,  alluvial  mud  was,  as  a  rule, 
knee-deep,  sometimes  much  deeper.  We  plowed  and 
waded  through  it  resolutely,  if  not  cheerfully.  Each  of 
us  might  have  been  nicknamed,  and  not  inappropriately, 
**Rain-in-the-Face,"  because  we  braved  so  many  rain- 
storms and  were  wet  and  muddy  for  a  month.  Being 
very  susceptible  to  hoarseness,  I  carried  with  me  con- 
stantly a  bottle  of  horse  liniment  and  about  a  half-yard 
of  red  flannel.  Every  night  I  anointed  my  throat  and 
breast  liberally  with  the  liniment,  heated  the  red  flannel 
as  hot  as  possible,  clapped  it  on  throat  and  chest,  went 
to  bed,  and  slept  like  a  top.  Otherwise  I  would  have 
broken  down  with  hoarseness  and  cold  on  my  lungs. 
What  remedy,  if  any,  he  used  this  deponent  sayeth  not, 
because  he  knoweth  not.  It  would  not  be  much  exag- 
geration to  say  that  we  wallowed  through  that  campaign 
in  Audrain. 

I  swept  the  county  by  eight  hundred  and  sixty-eight 
majority. 

Outside  of  Crawford  County  in  the  Ozarks,  each  of  us 
had  thirty-one  delegates.  The  way  that  happened  was 
this:  The  custom  in  constituting  a  convention  was  that 
each  county  was  entitled  to  one  delegate  for  every  two 
hundred  and  fifty  Democratic  votes  cast  in  the  last  presi- 
dential election,  or  a  major  fraction  thereof.    Nobody 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  171 

dreamed  of  any  other  basis  until  all  the  counties  except 
Crawford  had  selected  delegates  or  were  certain  for  the 
one  or  the  other  of  us.  It  must  be  remembered  that  the 
counties  voted  under  the  unit  rule.  On  the  basis  of  the 
last  presidential  vote  I  had  thirty-five  delegates  and  Colo- 
nel Norton  thirty-two,  outside  of  Crawford.  But  sud- 
denly the  Congressional  Committee,  which  was  friendly 
to  him,  convened,  issued  the  call  for  the  convention,  fixing 
the  basis  for  delegates  on  the  off-year  vote  of  1890,  by 
which  I  lost  four  delegates  and  Colonel  Norton  one — a 
net  loss  of  three  to  me,  with  the  result  that  outside  of 
Crawford  there  would  be  a  tie — thus  in  effect  conferring 
on  Craw^ford,  a  new  and  remote  county  in  the  district,  the 
honor  and  power  of  selecting  a  Representative  in  Congress. 
On  the  part  of  my  friends  a  great  uproar  ensued. 

They  denounced  the  action  of  the  committee  in  lan- 
guage not  fit  to  be  mentioned  to  ears  polite;  they  got  up 
protests  numerously  signed;  they  did  all  that  mortal 
man  could  do,  short  of  physical  violence,  but  without 
avail.  The  Congressional  Committee  was  deaf,  dumb, 
and  blind  as  to  their  protestations,  objurgations,  and 
maledictions.  The  committee  stood  by  its  guns  without 
flinching  or  wavering.  There  was  nothing  to  do  about 
it  except  to  grin  and  bear  it— which  I  did. 

In  1894,  when  the  tables  were  turned  and  the  Con- 
gressional Committee,  then  friendly  to  me,  performed 
the  same  strong-arm  stunt  by  basing  delegates  on  the 
Congressional  vote  of  1892  instead  of  on  the  presidential 
vote  of  that  year,  thereby  placing  my  renomination  be- 
yond a  peradventure,  so  that  I  had  ^no  opposition  in  the 
convention.  Col.  John  W.  Jacks,  editor  of  The  MonU 
gomery  Standard,  now  my  very  good  friend,  then  decidedly 
otherwise,  sadly  and  tersely  remarked  in  his  paper:  "It 
would  be  a  blamed  good  thing  if  the  Congressional  Com- 
mittee could  be  abolished  altogether!"  If  the  colonel's 
vocabulary  had  not  been  restricted  by  his  high  standing 


172   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

in  the  church,  no  doubt  his  statement  would  have  been 
even  more  vigorous  and  somewhat  sulphurous,  and,  to 
tell  the  plain,  unvarnished  truth,  I  would  not  have  criti- 
cized him  had  he  sworn  after  the  manner  of  a  Jack  Tar 
or  the  "Army  in  Flanders." 

The  action  of  the  Congressional  Committee  having 
narrowed  the  contest  to  Crawford,  Colonel  Norton  and 
I,  both  utter  strangers  to  her  people,  proceeded  to  that 
county  and  entered  upon  the  last  lap  of  our  Congressional 
Marathon.  It  was  a  fight  for  blood.  No  quarter  was 
asked,  expected,  or  given.  We  worked,  talked,  and  wrote 
incessantly.  We  made  stump  speeches,  two  daily,  some- 
times three.  We  solicited  votes  personally.  We  trav- 
eled in  passenger-cars,  on  freight-trains  .  and  hand-cars; 
in  buggies,  on  horseback,  and  occasionally  on  foot.  We 
had  friends  and  agents  by  the  dozen  traversing  the  county, 
as  old  man  Harper  of  Kentucky  proudly  boasted  he  ran 
his  horses,  "from  eend  to  eend."  We  never  let  up  for 
rain,  hail,  snow,  flood,  storms,  mud,  dust,  cold,  or  heat. 
On  March  20th  I  weighed  two  hundred  and  ten.  In 
November  I  tipped  the  scales  at  one  hundred  and  eighty- 
five.  I  had  worked  and  sweat  off  twenty-five  pounds 
and  was  "hard  as  nails."  Colonel  Norton  was  in  the 
same  condition.  We  were  down  to  our  fighting  weights 
— in  pink  of  condition] 

In  short,  we  did  everything  possible  that  was  proper, 
and,  in  the  retrospect,  I  am  incHned  to  beheve  that  we 
did  some  things  which  were  not  strictly  proper. 

Large  in  area,  hilly,  almost  mountainous  in  parts, 
sparsely  populated,  cut  by  mountain  streams  which  sud- 
denly became  raging  torrents,  past  fording,  at  every 
heavy  rain — and  it  rained  almost  every  day — Crawford 
was  exceedingly  difficult  to  canvass.  Nevertheless,  there 
is  hardly  a  quarter-section  of  land  within  her  wide-ex- 
tended borders  on  which  Colonel  Norton  and  myself 
have  not  both  stood,  but  as  a  rule  not  simultaneously. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  173 

/ 

If  any  voter  escaped  being  buttonholed  by  both  of  us  it 
was  because  he  "saw  us  first"  and  was  too  fleet  of  foot. 
It  was  a  six  weeks'  man-hunt.  We  both  had  our  wives 
down  there  to  aid  and  comfort  us.  My  wife  came  down 
first,  bringing  with  her  our  infant  son,  Bennett  Champ, 
then  a  wee  toddler  two  and  a  half  years  old,  now  a  strap- 
ping big  upstanding  six-footer.  He  was  a  colonel  of 
infantry  in  our  army  in  Europe.  There  was  only  one 
negro  in  the  county,  George,  a  factotum  of  the  only  hotel 
in  the  city  of  Cuba,  good-natured,  kind-hearted,  who 
frequently  looked  too  long  on  the  wine  when  it  was  red 
in  the  cup — in  his  case  "mountain  dew,"  or  in  plain  words 
moonshine  whisky.  He  and  Bennett  struck  up  a  warm 
friendship.  Mrs.  Clark  came  down  first  and  the  Norton 
adherents  made  merry,  but  they  soon  changed  their 
minds  and  Colonel  Norton  sent  for  his  wife.  It  should 
be  written  down  here  that  while  these  two  women  entered 
thoroughly  into  the  spirit  of  the  campaign  and  worked 
like  beavers  in  all  decent  ways  for  the  success  of  their 
husbands,  they  never  violated  the  proprieties  in  the  slight- 
est manner. 

I  began  the  canvass  in  Crawford,  wearing  heavy  winter 
clothes,  including  a  big  chinchilla  overcoat  and  arctic 
overshoes.  June  24th,  the  day  of  the  double-headed 
Cuba  mass-meeting  to  select  delegates,  I  wore  an  alpaca 
suit,  and  came  near  melting  with  fervent  heat.  The 
county  was  in  turmoil  and  uproar  in  every  nook  and 
comer.  Every  voter  was  electioneering  with  some  other 
voter. 

I  have  already  stated  that  the  county  abounded  in 
mountain  streams  which  rose  to  great  heights  suddenly 
and  unexpectedly.  One  of  these  surprising  rises  came 
near  being  the  death  of  me.  One  evening,  through  a 
combined  hail-  and  rain-storm  of  much  violence,  I  reached 
a  village  in  the  extreme  southeast  corner  of  the  county, 
drenched  to  the  skin  and  mud-bespattered,  and  spoke  at 


174   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

night  in  a  blacksmith  shop.  This  little  corner,  with  only 
about  a  dozen  Crawford  people  living  in  it,  was  separated 
from  the  rest  of  the  county  by  the  Hussah  River.  Next 
morning  it  was  booming.  In  order  to  reach  my  next 
appointment  I  had  to  cross  that  angry  and  swollen  stream. 
One  of  my  friends,  Frank  Wagner,  was  driving  the  buggy, 
pulled  by  two  wiry  little  Mexican  mustang  ponies.  Wag- 
ner, an  East-Tennesseean,  who  had  served  four  years  in 
the  Confederate  Army,  had  more  nerve  than  discretion 
and  was  thoroughly  devoted  to  me.  He  weighed  little 
above  one  hundred  pounds  and  was  true  as  steel,  but  he 
came  near  losing  his  candidate  for  Congress  by  drown- 
ing. When  we  reached  the  bank  of  the  river  I  told  Wagner 
that  it  was  dangerous  and  that  we  had  best  not  try  to 
cross  it.  He  made  fun  of  my  suggestion,  but  inquired  of 
a  man  close  at  hand,  building  a  fence,  if  the  river  was  ford- 
able.  He  said  he  thought  it  was,  but  that  nobody  had 
forded  it  that  morning.  So  over  my  protest  Wagner 
plunged  in.  As  soon  as  the  horses  struck  the  water  they 
began  to  swim  and  the  buggy  to  float.  Being  nearly 
twice  as  heavy  as  Wagner,  the  buggy  began  to  careen  on 
my  side.  I  told  Wagner  that  if  I  stayed  in  the  buggy  it 
would  turn  over  and  we  would  both  go  to  Davy  Jones's 
locker  together.  So  I  jumped  out  into  the  icy  water, 
which  came  up  to  my  armpits,  straightened  the  buggy 
up,  and  loosed  the  head  of  one  of  the  ponies,  whose  bridle 
was  entangled  with  the  end  of  the  buggy  tongue.  Wag- 
ner drove  out  and  I  waded  out.  As  I  had  on  a  heavy 
chinchilla  overcoat  and  arctic  overshoes,  I  must  have 
weighed  several  hundred  pounds  when  I  reached  terra 
firma.     Neither  of  us  had  on  a  stitch  of  dry  raiment. 

On  a  near-by  hillside  lived  a  venerable  man,  "Old 
Uncle  Neal  Brickey."  We  stopped  at  his  house,  stripped 
ourselves  naked  as  we  were  born,  wrung  the  water  out  of 
our  clothes,  and  hung  part  of  them  in  front  of  a  roaring 
log  fire  which  was  blazing  and  crackling  in  an  old-fash- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  175 

ioned  fireplace  about  ten  feet  wide.  The  rest  we  hung 
on  the  fence  in  the  bright  sunshine.  Wagner  came  in, 
winking  in  a  mysterious  manner,  and  asked  me  if  I  ever 
took  a  drink.  I  answered,  "Yes,  at  rare  intervals,  and 
if  ever  a  man  needed  one  it  is  now."  So  he  escorted  me 
out  to  the  kitchen,  where  Uncle  Neal  produced  a  half- 
gallon  bottle  of  "white  whisky,''  colorless  as  water.  We 
sampled  it  Hberally,  and  it  proved  to  be  an  exhilarating 
tipple  and  grateful  to  the  palate. 

After  drying  our  clothes  somewhat,  Wagner  and  I  re- 
sumed our  journey.  When  we  were  out  of  ear-shot  I 
said:  "Frank,  where  did  Uncle  Neal  get  that  *  white 
whisky'?"  With  an  illuminating  smile,  he  replied,  "Saint 
Louis!"  "Oh!"  I  said,  "tell  that  to  the  marines.  That's 
moonshine — the  first  I  ever  tasted."  There  the  conver- 
sation dropped.     That  was  in  April. 

Now  for  the  sequel.  A  few  days  after  the  November 
election  I  saw,  to  my  regret,  in  the  St.  Louis  papers  an 
article  with  flaring  head-lines,  giving  a  long  and  racy 
account  of  the  arrest  and  conviction  in  the  Federal  court 
of  my  venerable  host.  Uncle  Neal,  for  moonshining.  The 
reporters  had  great  fun  at  his  expense,  stating  among 
other  things  that  he  was  the  most  incorrigible  moonshiner 
in  the  Ozarks.     (Exit  Uncle  Neal.) 

I  had  another  unusual  experience  in  the  Crawford  cam- 
paign with  watercourses,  aggravating  then,  amusing  now, 
dangerous  never.  I  was  to  wind  up  my  stumping  tour 
in  the  county  with  a  daytime  speech  at  Cuba,  at  which 
a  large  audience  was  expected.  The  night  before  I  spoke 
at  the  Iron  School-house,  some  eight  or  nine  miles  west  of 
that  city.  It  was  a  very  dark  night,  but  I  was  anxious 
to  reach  Cuba  to  get  my  mail,  hear  the  news,  consult  my 
friends,  and  see  my  wife  and  baby.  I  did  not  know  the 
route,  so  I  asked  several  men  to  ride  in  with  me,  offering 
to  pay  hotel  bills  and  expenses,  but  they  declined,  saying 
they  had  on  their  workday  clothes  and  wanted  to  dress 


176   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

up  for  the  Cuba  rally  next  day.  Finally  one  suggested 
that  he  would  put  me  in  "the  Iron  Road"  which  ran 
through  Cuba,  and  as  the  Mexican  mustang  ponies  I  was 
driving  belonged  in  Cuba,  all  I  had  to  do  was  to  give  them 
their  heads  and  they  would  go  straight  home.  Knowing 
a  good  deal  about  horses  in  general,  and  precious  little 
about  the  vagaries  and  perversity  of  Mexican  mustang 
ponies,  I  thought  that  a  reasonable  program.  The  man 
put  me  in  "the  Iron  Road,'*  so  called  because  over  it, 
before  the  railroad  penetrated  the  Ozarks,  vast  quanti- 
ties of  iron  and  iron  ore  were  hauled  to  boat  landings  on 
the  Missouri  River.  I  gave  the  ponies  free  rein  and  they 
went  up  hill  and  down  dale  as  fast  as  they  could  clatter. 
At  last  I  could  tell  that  we  were  approaching  a  stream. 
When  they  got  into  the  water  I  knew  that  they  were 
acquainted  with  the  ford,  and  let  them  go  as  they  pleased. 
They  splashed  along  till  the  limbs  of  a  tree  raked  my  hat. 
Then  1  realized  that  instead  of  crossing  they  had  turned 
up  the  stream.  It  was  black  as  pitch.  I  stopped  them 
and  looked  as  best  1  could  to  learn  the  situation.  I  dis- 
covered that  I  was  in  a  narrow  channel,  with  high,  steep 
banks,  with  water  up  to  the  bed  of  the  buggy.  I  tried 
to  turn  those  hammer-headed  ponies  around,  but  there 
was  not  room  enough.  Then  1  endeavored  to  back  them 
out,  when  one  of  the  ponies  deliberately  lay  down  in  the 
water.  1  got  on  the  buggy-tongue  and  lashed  him  with 
the  whip,  and  bellowed  at  him,  but  without  avail.  I 
yelled  at  the  top  of  my  voice  for  help,  but  not  a  human 
being  responded.  I  got  out  in  the  water  up  to  my  waist 
and  carefully  felt  around  to  see  if  his  feet  were  caught  in 
the  tree-roots,  and  found  they  were  not.  I  tried  to  Hft 
him  up,  but  could  not.  I  kicked  him  in  the  ribs,  but  that 
had  no  effect  on  him.  He  was  enjoying  his  cool  bath, 
while  I  was  sweating  at  every  pore.  I  pulled  my  knife 
out,  cut  the  harness  off  of  him,  made  him  get  up,  mounted 
the  other  pony,  and  rode  bareback  four  miles  into  town. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  177 

stripped  my  wet  clothes  ofF,  and  gave  George,  the  sole 
man  of  color  in  the  county,  a  dollar  to  sit  up  all  night 
and  dry  them  out  by  the  kitchen  stove.  All  the  Norton 
men  swore  I  got  into  that  hole  of  water  because  1  was 
drunk — a  wicked  fabrication  which  I  did  not  hear  the 
last  of  for  many  a  day.  Crawford  was  detached  from 
my  district  and  put  into  a  new  district  ten  years  later, 
but  that  fable  may  be  floating  around  in  the  Ozarks  yet, 
for  all  that  I  know,  but  I  do  know  that  for  me  it  was  a 
most  unpleasant  night. 

All  the  hairbreadth  escapes  were  not  for  me.  Of  course 
I  am  not  so  fully  informed  as  to  what  happened  to  Colonel 
Norton  as  I  am  as  to  what  happened  to  me.  However, 
I  heard  of  one  ride  that  he  made,  which  neither  he  nor  I 
would  have  made  by  night  at  any  time  since  for  a  thou- 
sand dollars.  One  Saturday  night  he  was  making  a 
speech,  about  fifteen  miles  from  the  nearest  depot,  Keys- 
ville,  on  the  Salem  branch  of  the  Frisco  Railroad.  About 
ten  o^clock  a  messenger  galloped  up  and  handed  him  a 
telegram,  calling  him  to  meet  in  St.  Louis  on  Sunday 
morning  a  very  prominent  man  of  our  district  on  most 
pressing  business  touching  our  campaign.  The  night  was 
of  inky  darkness.  Colonel  Norton  and  his  fidus  Achates, 
Hon.  Frank  H.  Farris,  since  state  senator,  now  and  for 
several  years  a  prominent  member  of  the  Legislature,  set 
out  for  Keysville  in  a  buggy  drawn  by  a  pair  of  Mexican 
mustang  ponies — the  meanest  of  the  equine  species — 
over  one  of  the  worst  and  most  dangerous  roads  in  Amer- 
ica, at  a  breakneck  speed.  They  reached  Keysville  a  few 
minutes  after  the  last  train  on  the  branch  line  had  left 
for  the  junction  with  the  main  line  at  Cuba,  and  there 
was  no  Sunday  train  on  the  branch!  But  Colonels  Nor- 
ton and  Farris  were  too  resolute  to  balk  at  a  little  thing 
like  that.  So  Colonel  Norton  aroused  the  section  boss 
and  paid  him  hberally  to  take  them  to  Cuba — a  distance 
of  ten  or  twelve  miles — on  a  hand-car.    Alack!  and  also 

Vol.  I.— 12 


178   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

alas!  they  reached  Cuba  just  in  time  to  see  the  tail-Kghts 
of  the  St.  Louis  passenger-train  disappearing  in  the  dis^- 
tance!  After  the  fashion  of  Lord  UlUn,  on  an  occasion 
made  famous  by  the  poet  Campbell,  Colonel  Norton  was 
"left  lamenting/'  The  tradition  in  the  neighborhood  is 
that  for  some  minutes  the  atmosphere  about  the  Cuba 
depot  was  of  a  decidedly  cerulean  hue;  but  he  was  not 
to  be  balked  of  meeting  the  prominent  citizen  aforesaid 
in  St.  Louis,  so  in  four  or  five  hours  he  boarded  a  freight- 
train,  and  in  much  discomfort  rode  ninety-odd  miles  to 
the  great  "City  of  the  Iron  Crown.'* 

To  everything  an  end  must  come,  and  finally  the  cam- 
paign in  Crawford  was  closed  in  dramatic  fashion. 

Colonel  Norton  controlled  the  County  Committee  which 
selected  Cuba,  almost  on  the  edge  of  the  big  county  at 
the  junction  of  two  branches  of  the  Frisco,  as  the  place 
for  the  mass-meeting.  I  wanted  it  at  Steeleville,  the 
county-seat,  almost  in  the  center  of  the  county.  Norton 
and  I  each  ran  two  special  trains  into  Cuba  for  the  use 
of  our  supporters,  one  each  from  the  southern  line  of  the 
county  and  one  each  from  the  northern  line  thereof.  No 
matter  which  of  us  won,  the  Frisco  Railroad  Company 
was  ahead.  Hundreds  of  men  rode  thirty  miles  in  buggies 
or  farm-wagons  and  horseback,  to  participate  in  that 
famous  mass-meeting,  an  event  from  which  other  events 
in  that  vicinage  have  been  dated  ever  since.  Many 
trudged  the  weary  distance  on  foot,  starting  the  day 
before.  Scores  of  women  graced  the  spectacle  with  their 
presence.     It  was  a  great  day  for  Cuba. 

While  there  were  only  twelve  hundred  and  fifty  Demo- 
crats in  the  county,  at  least  two  thousand  marched  in  our 
processions,  with  banners  waving,  fifes  shriUing,  drums 
beating,  and  brass  bands  braying.  Where  the  extra  eight 
hundred  men  came  from  I  do  not  know.  They  may  have 
been  Republicans  out  for  a  lark,  which  is  probably  the 
truth — though  each  side  vociferously  asseverated  that  the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  179 

other  had  imported  them  from  outside  the  county.  If  I 
were  going  to  guess  I  would  say  that  it  was  about  an  even 
break  in  that  regard. 

Under  a  wide-spreading  umbrageous  oak  on  the  college 
green,  the  chairman  of  the  Democratic  County  Commit- 
tee, Captain  Ferguson,  standing  in  a  wagon-bed,  called 
the  mass-meeting  to  order  promptly  at  one  o'clock,  the 
hour  agreed  on,  whereupon  the  county  attorney,  Hon. 
John  T.  Woodruff,  only  twenty-four  years  old,  now  one 
of  the  most  prominent  lawyers  in  southwest  Missouri, 
nominated  five  delegates  and  moved  that  they  be  in- 
structed for  me,  which  was  done  instanter  and  with  a 
whoop,  and  the  mass-meeting  adjourned  sine  die.  For 
some  reason  not  many  of  Colonel  Norton's  supporters 
attended  that  mass-meeting. 

In  a  few  moments  his  followers  arrived,  organized 
another  mass-meeting,  elected  five  delegates,  and  in- 
structed them  for  him;  but  as  the  credentials  of  my 
delegates  were  signed  by  the  venerable  chairman  of  the 
County  Committee,  who  was  also  chairman  of  the  mass- 
meeting  which  selected  them,  and  were  signed  also  by 
the  county  attorney,  who  was  also  secretary  of  both  the 
County  Committee  and  of  the  mass-meeting,  they  were 
considered  regular. 

Much  acrimonious  newspaper  controversy  ensued,  grow- 
ing out  of  the  double-headed  Cuba  mass-meeting. 

This  testimony  should  be  borne  to  the  good  people  of 
Crawford  County.  With  the  town  overrun  by  a  crowd 
too  big  to  be  comfortably  entertained  on  a  bhstering  hot 
day,  in  the  midst  of  a  personal  and  political  contest  waged 
with  exceeding  fury,  not  a  fight  occurred,  not  even  a 
scrap  of  fisticuffs.  Some  angry  conversation  was  had, 
some  loud,  tumultuous,  offensive,  and  profane  language 
was  hurled  through  the  air;  but  there  were  no  bloody 
noses  and  no  broken  bones. 

Though  more  than  twenty-six  years  have  gone  to  join 


i8o   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

the  centuries  since  that  spectacular  performance,  many  of 
the  men  who  most  earnestly  and  most  stoutly  opposed 
me  that  sweltering  day  at  Cuba  have  been  among  my 
stanchest  friends  and  supporters. 

At  last  came  the  district  convention.  The  Montgomery 
court-house  was  crowded.  So  were  the  lobbies,  the  corri- 
dors, and  other  rooms.  A  multitude  of  excited  people  filled 
the  court-house  yard  and  the  near-by  streets.  Men 
were  there  from  every  nook  and  corner  of  the  district. 
Many  hot,  verbal  encounters  were  had,  and  at  least  one 
bloodless  fist  fight.  Reverend  Doctor  Hardesty,  a  Nor- 
ton enthusiast,  now  one  of  my  best  friends,  prayed  for 
peace  in  tones  which  Stentor  might  have  envied.  He  has 
since  been  chaplain  of  the  Missouri  Senate.  Each,  as 
before  stated,  had  a  delegation  from  Crawford  County, 
of  five  delegates.  The  Norton  delegation  was  the  con- 
testing delegation.  I  had  thirty-six  regular  delegates. 
He  had  thirty-one  regulars  besides  his  five  Crawford 
County  delegates.  The  Congressional  Committee  was 
for  him.  They  brought  in  a  rule  that  his  five  Crawford 
County  men  should  sit  in  the  convention  and  vote  the 
same  as  the  other  delegates  did — even  vote  on  the  ques- 
tion of  their  own  seats.  Of  course  this  made  an  absolute 
deadlock.  The  Congressional  Committee  named  Henry 
Clark  for  chairman.  My  friends  on  the  committee 
brought  in  a  minority  report,  nominating  George  W. 
Whitecotton  for  chairman.  They  voted  on  Whitecotton 
and  it  was  a  tie.  They  voted  on  Clark  and  it  was  a  tie. 
Then  a  distinguished  statesman  argued  that  because 
Whitecotton  failed  to  get  a  majority  Clark  became  chair- 
man ipso  facto.  The  temporary  chairman  of  the  con- 
vention did  not  exactly  decide  that  way,  but  he  did  what 
was  equivalent  to  it — he  appointed  a  committee  to  escort 
Clark  to  the  platform  to  act  as  chairman.  Just  as  Clark, 
who  was  a  large,  handsome  man,  reached  out  to  take  the 
gavel,  with  a  broad  smile  on  his  face,  Whitecotton  tapped 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  i8i 

him  on  the  arm  and  said:  "When  you  preside  here,  I 
preside.'*  Clark  wanted  to  know  what  he  meant. 
Whitecotton  said  that  he  was  elected  chairman  of  the 
convention  by  precisely  the  same  vote  that  Clark  was 
and  that  if  Clark  presided  he  would  preside,  and  if  Clark 
wanted  to  get  along  peaceably  all  well  and  good,  and  if 
he  did  not,  all  well  and  good.  Of  course  pandemonium 
ensued,  and  at  least  thirty  pistols  clicked  in  a  half  min- 
ute. Finally  somebody  suggested  that  they  adjourn 
until  after  supper,  which  they  did,  and  no  doubt  thereby 
prevented  a  general  fusillade. 

During  the  recess  Clark  sent  for  me  and  I  went  to  see 
him,  accompanied  by  two  reliable  witnesses.  He  said 
that  he  did  not  want  to  preside,  but  that  his  friends 
wanted  him  to  preside,  and  that  if  I  would  agree  to  his 
presiding  he  would  not  cast  his  vote  as  chairman  even 
on  the  question  to  adjourn,  but  would  vote  in  his  own 
delegation,  where  he  had  a  right  to  vote.  I  said,  "Mr. 
Clark,  some  years  ago  when  you  were  chairman  of  the 
Montgomery  County  Committee  you  insisted  that  you 
had  a  right  to  cast  your  vote  as  a  member  of  the  committee 
to  make  a  tie  and  then  cast  your  vote  as  chairman  to 
untie  the  tie,  and  I  will  have  none  of  that."  He  replied 
that  that  was  the  one  political  act  of  his  life  that  he  re- 
gretted and  that  he  would  keep  the  faith  in  this  Congres- 
sional Convention.  I  consented,  and  so  did  Whitecotton, 
that  when  the  convention  reassembled  after  supper 
Whitecotton  would  withdraw  his  name  and  move  that 
Clark  be  elected  by  acclamation,  and  it  was  so  done; 
but  the  time  was  so  short  that  several  of  Colonel  Norton's 
delegates  had  not  heard  of  this  arrangement  and,  not 
knowing  what  was  up,  voted  against  their  own  chairman 
when  the  vote  was  taken.  It  should  be  stated  here,  and 
I  do  so  with  pleasure,  that  Mr.  Chairman  Clark,  being  an 
honorable  man,  did  precisely  what  he  said  he  would  do. 
Clark  and  Whitecotton  are  both  in  their  graves;   I  hope 


i82   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

that  "after  life's  fitful  fever  they  sleep  well."  We  stayed 
there  six  days  in  convention  assembled.  We  could  not 
even  adjourn  for  our  meals,  or  overnight,  unless  Norton 
and  I  both  consented  to  it.  Finally  we  signed  an  agree- 
ment to  adjourn  for  ten  days  so  that  we  could  attend  the 
state  convention  and  log-roll  for  a  State  Committeeman, 
as  we  both  knew  that  we  would  finally  land  in  the  hands 
of  the  State  Committee.  At  the  state  convention  Nor- 
ton got  the  State  Committeeman  by  one  vote.  After 
this  recess  agreed  upon  the  convention  met  again  and 
stayed  in  session  three  days.  Finally  I  told  my  men 
that  I  had  a  majority  in  the  convention  and  wanted  the 
nomination — wanted  it  in  time  to  go  to  St.  Louis.  So 
they  organized  a  convention  in  the  convention  and  nom- 
inated me.  Three  hours  later  Colonel  Norton's  dele- 
gates nominated  him.  Finally  the  State  Committee 
notified  us  both  to  appear  before  them  to  see  if  anything 
could  be  done  to  iron  out  the  ugly  situation.  The  State 
Committee  ordered  a  primary,  not  a  blanket  primary, 
but  they  rigged  up  a  scheme  whereby  they  hoped  to  beat 
me  out  of  the  nomination  and  at  the  same  time  satisfy 
my  friends.  They  ordered  that  on  the  same  day  each 
county  should  hold  a  primary  not  to  vote  for  Colonel 
Norton  and  me,  but  to  vote  for  Clark  delegates  and 
Norton  delegates  to  a  new  convention  to  be  held  at  St. 
Charles  on  August  31st,  which  was  done.  I  carried  the 
district,  if  they  had  counted  the  votes  under  the  blanket 
primary  plan,  by  over  three  thousand,  but  they  voted  by 
counties,  and  I  carried  Montgomery  County,  which  in  the 
new  district  was  the  pivotal  county,  by  only  eleven  votes 
out  of  a  poll  of  two  thousand.  On  a  recount  demanded 
by  Colonel  Norton  it  turned  out  that  I  carried  it  by  twelve. 
I  was  duly  nominated  at  St.  Charles,  August  31st. 

There  never  would  have  been  any  trouble  about  it  if 
a  reapportionment  had  not  been  made  between  1890  and 
1892.    One  county  was  taken  out  of  the  old  district 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  183 

and  two  brand-new  counties  down  in  the  foot-hills  of 
the  Ozarks  put  in.  I  carried  Audrain  County  in  1892 
by  eight  hundred  and  sixty-eight,  which  was  the  pivotal 
county  in  1890,  when  Colonel  Norton  beat  me  eighty-seven 
votes  in  that  county.  The  placing  of  the  two  new  coun- 
ties in  the  new  district  and  taking  out  the  old  one  was 
what  made  such  a  long-drawn-out  and  ugly  contest. 

The  bitterness  of  these  various  campaigns,  beginning 
with  '84  up  to  and  including  '92,  was  indescribable.  So 
while  I  had  nothing  to  do  particularly  with  the  campaigns 
of  '84,  '86,  and  '88,  I  inherited  the  bitterness.  Men 
who  had  been  friends  for  a  lifetime  got  so  angry  at  each 
other  that  the)^  would  not  speak  as  they  passed  by. 

(Two  men  who  had  lived  side  by  side  ever  since  they 
were  boys  on  adjoining  farms,  and  who  had  never  seen 
either  Colonel  Norton  or  myself,  met  in  the  big  road,  fell 
to  arguing  about  us,  then  to  quarreling  about  us,  then 
got  down  off  of  their  horses  and,  grabbing  fence  stakes, 
nearly  killed  each  other,  j  The  upshot  of  all  of  this  bitter- 
ness was  that  I  ran  five  hundred  votes  behind  the  ticket. 
If  Colonel  Norton  had  been  the  nominee  he  would  have 
run  behind  the  ticket.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  no  Demo- 
cratic candidate  for  Congress  in  the  district  ever  ran  up 
with  the  ticket  from  1882  to  1898.  That  year  I  ran  up 
with  the  ticket  and  have  been  running  more  and  more 
ahead  of  it  ever  since.  Colonel  Norton  went  back  to  his 
law  practice  and  amassed  a  new  fortune.  Judge  Robin- 
son went  to  Kansas  City  and  is  making  fifteen  or  twenty 
thousand  dollars  a  year  practising  law,  perhaps  more. 

Thus  in  brief  is  stated  an  eight-year  warfare  in  the  dis- 
trict which  perhaps  has  no  parallel  in  any  rural  district 
in  America. 

The  day  of  the  double-headed  convention  at  Mont- 
gomery City  I  went  to  St.  Louis.  After  supper  1  walked 
into  the  editorial  rooms  of  The  St.  Louis  Republic,  and 
learned   more   about  metropolitan  journalism  in   a  few 


184   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

minutes  than  I  had  learned  in  forty-two  years  of  taber- 
nacling in  the  flesh.  A  big  fat  man  seemed  to  be  the 
presiding  genius.  1  inquired  where  Col.  Charles  H.  Jones, 
editor-in-chief,  one  of  my  warm  friends,  was.  "He's  in 
Europe,"  quoth  the  obese  one.  I  asked  him  where  Col. 
Bob  Yost,  second  in  command,  another  of  my  steadfast 
friends,  was.  "At  Hot  Springs,  Arkansas,"  repHed  the 
editorial  FalstafF.  "  Who's  running  this  paper  ?"  1  queried. 
"I  am!"  he  answered,  firmly.  "Who  are  you?"  I  mur- 
mured. "Tm  the  city  editor,"  was  his  answer.  I  said, 
"1  am  Champ  Clark;  Col.  Dick  Norton  and  1  were  both 
nominated  for  Congress  to-day  at  Montgomery  City  and 
I  want  The  Republic  to  give  me  a  square  deal  to-morrow." 
He  rose  from  his  chair  and,  while  a  broad  grin  spread 
over  his  expansive  countenance,  he  replied:  "Never  fear. 
I  will  give  you  both  a  square  deal.  I  want  to  see  you 
both  defeated — Fm  a  Republican!"  If  the  stars  had 
fallen  I  would  not  have  been  more  surprised,  for  in  my 
innocence  and  ignorance  I  had  always  supposed  that  all 
the  editors  and  reporters  of  a  Democratic  paper  were 
Democrats,  and  vice  versa,  I  was  utterly  dumfounded. 
After  I  recovered  my  equilibrium  somewhat  I  said: 
"What!  a  RepubHcan  running  a  great  Democratic  organ 
in  the  midst  of  a  hot  presidential  campaign?"  He  said, 
"Yes — precisely;  and  if  you  will  inquire  you  will  find 
that  half  the  reporters  on  this  paper  are  Republicans. 
Then,  after  you  have  absorbed  that  information,  go  over 
to  The  Globe-Democrat  office,  the  Republican  organ,  and 
you  will  discover  that  half  of  the  writing  force  on  that 
sheet  are  Democrats.  It  may  add  to  your  amazement 
that  Joe  McCullough,  the  brilliant  editor-in-chief  of  The 
Globe-Democraty  is  a  mossbacked  Democrat  and  votes  the 
Democratic  ticket  straight!"  By  that  time  I  was  limp 
as  a  dish-rag.  I  felt  very  humble,  but  1  collected  my  wits 
sufficiently  to  invite  him  down-stairs  for  refreshments, 
both  liquid  and  solid.    He  accepted. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  185 

Over  the  coffee  and  cigars  I  said :  "  The  Republic  cor- 
respondent at  Montgomery  City,  Col.  John  W.  Jacks,  and  I 
are  not  on  speaking  terms.  He  skins  me  in  his  paper  and  I 
skin  him  in  my  speeches.  He  will  put  me  in  bad  in  his  ac- 
count of  that  double-headed  convention  and  I  want  you  to 
see  that  I  get  a  chance  for  my  white  alley."  I  then  gave  him 
my  version  of  the  campaign  and  the  convention  as  best 
I  could.  By  that  time  he  had  become  very  friendly  and 
sympathetic.  When  I  had  finished  my  story  he  inquired: 
**What  can  I  do  to  help  you?"  I  replied,  "I  want  you 
to  sit  up  till  Jacks's  letter  arrives  and  see  to  it  that  I  get 
fair  treatment,"  which  he  did.  I  have  never  seen  my 
friend  since.  I  have  no  doubt  that  Colonel  Norton  and 
Colonel  Jacks  were  somewhat  astonished  next  morning 
when  they  saw  The  Republic,  whose  big  black  head-lines 
ran  in  this  wise:  "Champ  Clark  nominated  for  Congress 
—Dick  Norton  bolts!" 

I  do  not  mean  by  the  foregoing  to  convey  the  idea  that 
Colonel  Jacks  would  have  misstated  the  facts  intention- 
ally, but  he  was  so  enthusiastic  for  Norton  and  so  hostile 
to  me  that  it  was  inevitable  his  feelings  and  point  of  view 
might  color  his  description  of  things.  That  was  what  I 
was  afraid  of. 

Colonel  Jacks  and  I  were  long  since  reconciled.  For 
years  he  has  been  one  of  my  most  loyal  and  most  sensible 
friends.  Our  reconciliation  came  about  in  an  interesting 
way.  During  the  month  which  intervened  between  the 
extraordinary  and  regular  long  session  of  the  Fifty-third 
Congress,  in  the  autumn  of  1893,  I  traveled  over  my 
district,  looking  into  post-office  squabbles.  One  Sunday 
afternoon  I  reached  Montgomery  City  and  was  told  that 
Rev.  Noah  Dale  would  preach  that  night  in  the  Christian 
Church.  I  had  known  him  in  Kentucky  when  I  was  a 
boy.  He  had  been  very  kind  to  my  sister  when  she  was 
a  girl  and  had  been  instrumental  in  getting  her  into  the 
Midway  Female  College,  where  she  obtained  a  good  edu- 


i86   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

cation.  I  thought  I  could  not  do  less  than  go  to  hear 
him  preach,  recall  myself  to  his  memory,  and  thank  him 
for  his  kindness  to  my  sister.  So  with  some  friends  I 
went  to  the  church  before  services  began.  It  was  a  cool 
evening  and  a  fire  was  burning  in  a  box-stove  about  the 
center  of  the  room.  I  sat  down  by  the  stove  and  was 
engaged  in  conversation,  when  Colonel  Jacks,  an  elder  in 
that  church — as  I  am  an  elder  in  the  Bowling  Green 
Christian  Church — came  in.  He  walked  down  to  the 
pulpit  platform,  where  he  deposited  his  overcoat  and  hat. 
Then  he  looked  around  and  saw  me.  He  stood  there 
three  or  four  minutes,  puUing  his  long  chin  whiskers, 
which  he  has  since  shaved  off,  walked  back  to  where  I 
was  sitting,  and  offered  his  hand,  which  I  took  gladly — 
thus  ending  in  happy  manner  the  feud  betwixt  us  twain. 

I  have  often  wondered  what  was  passing  in  the  mind  of 
Colonel  Jacks  while  he  was  pulling  his  whiskers.  My 
guess  is  that  he  was  considering  what  was  his  Christian 
duty  in  the  premises.  At  any  rate,  he  did  it.  For  more 
than  a  year  he  has  been  journal  clerk  of  the  House  on 
my  appointment! 

There  never  would  have  been  any  deadlock  had  the 
Congressional  Committee  not  changed  the  basis  of  repre- 
sentation in  the  Congressional  convention. 

Even  with  that  change  there  would  have  been  no  dead- 
lock but  for  an  incident,  amusing  now,  but  aggravating 
and  almost  disastrous  to  me  then. 

Gasconade  County  has  only  about  five  hundred  Demo- 
crats, and  is  therefore  entitled  to  only  two  delegates.  Colo- 
nel Norton  and  I  both  were  strangers  therein.  I  knew 
only  one  man  in  the  county  and  had  seen  him  only  once. 
He  heard  me  make  a  speech  in  another  county  and  liked 
me  and  the  speech.  Consequently,  when  the  mass-meeting 
convened  in  Gasconade  he  was  for  me.  He  was  a  fine 
man,  but  an  incorrigible  joker.  So  when  somebody  nom- 
inated him  for  the  position  of  delegate,  his  humorous 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  187 

faculty  getting  the  better  of  him,  he  arose,  declared  he 
did  not  desire  to  be  elected  without  opposition,  and 
nominated  an  opponent  to  himself,  and,  unfortunately 
for  me,  his  opponent,  who  turned  out  to  be  a  strong 
Norton  man,  received  a  majority  of  one  vote! 

Just  why  men,  usually  rated  as  sensible,  will  endure  all 
sorts  of  labors,  hardships,  and  hazards,  even  to  jeopard- 
izing their  lives,  for  an  office,  the  reputation  for  holding 
which  is  as  evanescent  as  "the  rainbow's  glory"  or  as 
"poppies'  spread,"  or  as  "the  snowflake  in  the  river,"  is 
an  unsolved  and  insoluble  mystery  of  human  nature; 
but  there  is  something  inspiring,  fascinating,  and  exhila- 
rating in  a  stump  campaign  for  an  elective  office,  par- 
ticularly when  the  rivals  are  anything  like  equally 
matched.     They  are  animated  by 

The  stern  joy  which  warriors  feel 
In  foemen  worthy  of  their  steel. 

While  Colonel  Norton  and  I  were  as  determined  to  go 
to  Congress  as  any  two  men  that  ever  lived,  I  doubt 
whether  either  one  would  have  entered  the  contest  if  on 
the  20th  of  March  we  could  have  read  the  Book  of 
Fate  sufficiently  to  realize  the  labor,  turmoil,  and  risks 
we  were  compelled  to  endure  before  August  31st. 

I  am  still  in  Congress  and  I  am  glad  to  inform  the 
readers  hereof  that  my  antagonist  and  friend  prospered 
greatly  in  business  and  the  practice  of  the  law.  Since 
the  foregoing  was  written  he  has  died,  leaving  his  family 
amply  provided  for.  He  was  one  of  the  foremost  citizens 
of  Missouri  and  his  death  is  a  serious  loss  to  the  state. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

The  Congress. 

LORD  BACON  ranks  the  founders  of  states  (conditores 
'  imperioruMy  he  denominates  them)  as  among  the 
greatest  of  mankind. 

The  Constitutional  Convention  was  composed  of  the 
wisest  men  that  ever  met  under  one  roof.  The  most 
sensible  thing  done  by  the  Fathers  of  this  Republic 
was  the  distribution  of  the  powers  of  the  Federal  govern- 
ment into  three  departments;  the  legislative,  the  execu- 
tive, and  the  judicial. 

The  fact  that  a  bill  must  be  passed  by  the  House,  and 
also  by  the  Senate,  before  it  is  sent  to  the  President  for 
his  signature  gives  time  for  reflection,  discussion,  and 
analysis,  not  only  by  Representatives  and  Senators,  but 
by  the  public,  for  in  this  age  of  electricity  nearly  every- 
body betwixt  the  two  seas  knows  of  any  event  of  con- 
siderable importance  the  same  day,  or  not  later  than  the 
morning  after. 

The  next  wisest  thing  was  to  divide  the  Congress  into 
two  branches.  Some  lady  asked  George  Washington  at 
a  great  dinner  what  the  Senate  was  created  for  and  why 
there  were  two  legislative  branches  instead  of  only  one. 
He  said  that  the  Senate  would  perform  the  same  function 
for  legislation  that  a  saucer  did  for  tea;  that  they  would 
pour  the  hot  tea  of  the  House  into  the  saucer  of  the  Senate 
to  cool  off. 

Evidently,  while  General  Washington  was  both  a  great 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  189 

soldier  and  a  great  statesman,  he  was  not  up  to  date  in 
pink-tea  etiquette  or  he  would  not  have  said  anything 
about  pouring  tea  into  a  saucer.  I  have  sometimes 
thought  that,  in  these  latter  days,  it  is  the  hot  Senate 
tea  that  needs  cooling  off  quite  as  often  as  the  House  tea. 

In  a  few  matters  the  legislative  and  executive  powers 
overlap  and  coalesce. 

For  instance,  no  bill  becomes  a  law  unless  it  is  signed 
by  the  President,  or  unless  it  is  passed  over  his  veto  by 
a  majority  of  two-thirds  of  both  the  Senate  and  the  House; 
or  by  the  failure  of  the  President  to  sign  a  bill  within  ten 
days  (Sundays  barred)  after  the  bill  is  presented  to  him, 
while  the  Congress  is  in  session,  under  which  circumstances 
it  becomes  a  law. 

No  nomination  for  office  sent  by  the  President  to  the 
Senate  becomes  effective  unless  confirmed  by  it.  The 
President  negotiates  treaties  with  foreign  Powers,  but  they 
are  of  no  avail  unless  ratified  by  the  Senate. 

In  one  instance  the  legislative  and  judicial  functions 
mingle.  That  is  when  the  President  is  impeached  by 
the  House  and  is  on  trial  in  the  Senate.  The  Chief 
Justice  of  the  Supreme  Court  presides,  for  the  manifest 
and  sufficient  reason  that  the  Vice-President,  who  would 
be  the  beneficiary  of  the  conviction  of  the  President, 
should  not  be  permitted  to  preside. 

Of  course  in  such  case  the  Chief  Justice  cannot  vote  as 
to  the  guilt  or  innocence  of  the  accused.  He  simply  pre- 
sides, passing  on  the  admission  of  evidence,  etc.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  the  whole  impeachment  proceeding  is 
quasi-judicial,  the  House  sitting  as  a  grand  jury,  and  the 
Senate  afterward  sitting  as  a  petit  jury,  though  it  is 
called  the  High  Court  of  Impeachment. 

One  of  the  most  unseemly  events  in  our  history  was 
when  Senator  Benjamin  F.  Wade,  of  Ohio,  president  pro 
tempore  of  the  Senate,  voted  on  the  impeachment  of  Presi- 
dent  Andrew   Johnson — though   he   would   have   been 


I90   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

President  in  the  event  of  Johnson's  conviction — which, 
happily,  did  not  occur. 

Most  assuredly  the  reason  which  impelled  the  Fathers 
to  prohibit  the  Vice-President  from  presiding  in  the  im- 
peachment trial  of  a  President  was  the  fear  that  self- 
interest  might  warp  the  decisions  of  the  Vice-President. 
That  alone  should  also  have  excluded  Senator  Wade  from 
voting. 

It  will  be  understood  that  I  speak  of  the  Senate  and  of 
the  House  not  as  two  legislative  bodies,  but  as  two 
branches  of  the  Congress — which  is  correct,  notwithstand- 
ing popular  usage  to  the  contrary. 

A  few  years  ago  Gen.  Francis  Marion  Cockrell,  for 
thirty,  consecutive  years  a  prominent  Senator  from  Mis- 
souri, denominated  the  United  States  Senate  as  "the 
greatest  legislative  body  in  the  world,"  whereupon  Sena- 
tor John  C.  Spooner,  of  Wisconsin,  an  eminent  constitu- 
tional lawyer  and  considerable  of  a  wit,  said:  "The 
Senate  is  not  the  greatest  legislative  body  in  the  world. 
It  is  one  of  the  branches  of,  I  think,  perhaps  the  greatest 
legislative  body  in  the  world,  and  the  Senate  may  be  the 
greatest  part  of  the  greatest  legislative  body  in  the  world. 
I  am  not  disposed  to  dispute  that.  .  We  all  admit  that 
ourselves." 

The  making  of  the  Congress  in  its  present  shape  was 
one  of  the  many  compromises  of  the  Constitution,  with- 
out which  compromises  there  would  have  been  no  Con- 
stitution and  no  Union.  The  little  states,  fearful  of  being 
blotted  out  or  absorbed,  insisted  on  equal  representation 
in  both  Houses,  while  the  big  states,  reading  their  future 
greatness  by  the  eye  of  faith,  demanded  that  representa- 
tion in  both  Houses  should  be  based  on  population.  Con- 
sequence, a  deadlock. 

Finally  a  philosophic  patriot,  beHeving  that  safety  in 
that  matter,  as  in  most  others,  lay  in  medias  res,  cut  the 
Gordian  knot  by  suggesting  equal  representation  in  the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  191 

Senate  and  representation  based  on  population  in  the 
House. 

The  Httle  states,  however,  still  afraid  of  being  swal- 
lowed, insisted  that  these  words  be  inserted  in  the  Con- 
stitution: **No  state,  without  its  consent,  shall  be  de- 
prived of  its  equal  suffrage  in  the  Senate,"  and  it  was  so 
done,  which  was  a  notable  victory  for  the  smaller  states. 

As  it  is  a  thing  incredible  that  any  state  will  ever  con- 
sent to  being  deprived  of  its  equal  suffrage  in  the  Senate, 
those  folks  who,  impatient  of  the  influence  of  the  smaller 
states  in  the  Senate  and  ignorant  of  that  pecuHar  pro- 
vision in  the  Constitution,  propose  to  deprive  them  of 
their  equal  representation  in  the  Senate  or  to  abolish 
them  entirely  run  up  against  an  insurmountable  obstacle. 

That  is  the  only  part  of  the  Constitution  which  cannot 
be  amended  by  a  two-thirds  vote  of  both  Houses  of  Con- 
gress with  the  assistance  of  three-fourths  of  the  states. 

Most  assuredly  the  delegates  to  the  Constitutional 
Convention  from  the  little  states  were  wise  in  their  day 
and  generation.  The  result  is  that  so  long  as  grass  grows 
and  water  runs,  if  the  Republic  endures,  Nevada,  though 
her  population  never  reaches  the  hundred  thousand 
mark,  will  continue  to  have  equal  voice  in  the  Senate 
with  New  York,  though  her  miUions  of  people  should 
go  on  multiplying  ad  infinitum.  New  York  and  other 
big  and  populous  states  chafe  at  this  arrangement,  but 
they  cannot  escape  it,  for  it  is  so  nominated  in  the  bond. 

In  the  First  Congress  under  the  Constitutiont  here  were 
fifty-nine  Representatives  and  twenty-two  Senators.  Until 
Rhode  Island  and  North  Carolina  came  into  the  Union, 
when  there  were  sixty-five  Representatives  and  twenty- 
six  Senators.  To-day  the  Congress  has  four  hundred  and 
thirty-five  Representatives  and  ninety-six  Senators. 

In  the  House  there  sit  also  two  territorial  delegates, 
two  commissioners  from  the  Philippines,  and  one  from 
Porto  Rico.     The  delegates  have  all  the  privileges  enjoyed 


192   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

by  the  Representatives  except  that  of  voting  and  making 
a  motion  to  reconsider.  The  commissioners  are  still 
further  limited  in  their  privileges. 

The  only  portions  of  our  vast  possessions,  continental 
or  insular,  which  have  no  citizen  of  their  own  to  speak 
a  word  for  them  in  the  House  are  the  District  of  Columbia, 
Guam,  the  Canal  Zone,  and  the  Virgin  Islands. 

Two  days  out  of  every  month  the  House  sits  as  a  com- 
mon council  for  the  half-million  citizens  of  the  District 
of  Columbia,  who,  living  under  the  shadow  of  the  Capitol, 
have  no  more  voice  in  their  governmental  affairs  than  if 
they  were  denizens  of  the  Cannibal  Islands. 

A  man  who  can  think  of  a  sadder  commentary  on  our 
boasted  theory  of  representative  government  is  possessed 
of  an  imagination  gorgeous  beyond  sanity!  And  yet  our 
fathers  precipitated  the  Revolutionary  War  for  the  prin- 
ciple, "No  taxation  without  representation." 

Daniel  Webster  grandiloquently  declared  that  we  "went 
to  war  on  a  preamble,"  but  the  kernel  thereof  was,  "No 
taxation  without  representation." 

It  will  be  noted  from  the  foregoing  figures  that  at  the 
opening  of  the  First  Congress  the  voting  strength  of  one 
Senator  equaled  that  of  2^2  Representatives,  whereas 
now  it  equals  the  voting  strength  of  4IJ  Representa- 
tives. 

If  the  membership  of  the  House  continues  to  increase 
at  each  decennial  period — ^which  is  certain  to  happen  so 
long  as  the  population  continues  to  increase — the  voting 
strength  of  a  Senator  as  compared  with  that  of  a  Repre- 
sentative will  continue  to  increase  until  more  new  states 
are  admitted,  which  in  all  human  probability  will  not 
occur  soon. 

The  only  chance  for  new  states  within  a  generation  is 
that  Texas  might  conclude  to  divide  herself  into  as  many 
as  five  states,  which  she  has  a  right  to  do  under  our  con- 
tract of  annexation  whenever  she  gets  ready,  without 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  193 

asking  the  consent  of  anybody  except  her  own  people — 
a  thing  which  no  other  state  can  do.  But  the  partition 
of  Texas  is  not  at  all  likely.     State  pride  is  too  strong. 

There  is,  however,  a  strong  feehng  in  both  Congress 
and  the  country  against  further  increase  in  the  member- 
ship of  the  House,  although  we  have  the  smallest  member- 
ship of  all  the  great  nations,  population  considered,  in 
the  more  numerous  branch  of  our  national  legislature. 
For  instance,  the  British  House  of  Commons  has  seven 
hundred  and  seven  members,  with  not  half  our  popula- 
tion. Under  the  census  of  1850  the  Congress  actually 
reduced  the  membership  of  the  House  in  numbers,  but 
no  serious  attempt  in  that  direction  has  been  made  since, 
though  there  has  been  talk  about  it. 

It  is  superfluous  to  state  that  we  borrowed  our  frame- 
work of  government  from  England,  including  a  legislative 
body  with  two  branches,  substituting  an  elective  Senate, 
the  term  of  whose  members  is  six  years,  for  a  hereditary 
House  of  Lords. 

If  "imitation  is  the  sincerest  flattery,"  as  the  old  proverb 
runs,  we  have  abundant  reason  for  self-congratulation, 
for  almost  every  civilized  nation  on  the  globe,  monarchi- 
cal as  well  as  republican,  has  adopted  our  plan  of  a  two- 
branched  elective  legislative  body. 

In  passing  it  may  be  remarked — though  not  particu- 
larly pertinent  here,  that  when  Bismarck  modeled  the 
German  Empire,  composed  of  twenty-eight  kingdoms, 
principalities,  and  states,  each  with  its  separate  local 
government,  so  closely  on  our  dual  system  of  government, 
he  paid  us  the  highest  possible  compliment. 

We  boast  that  our  people  are  the  most  inteUigent  on 
the  globe.  There  is  more  pohtics  to  the  square  mile  in 
this  country  than  in  any  other  under  the  sun.  Men  fight 
for  seats  in  the  House  of  Representatives  as  if  to  gain 
that  greatly  coveted  goal  were  a  matter  of  life  and  death. 

From  forty  to  fifty  thousand  voters  in  each  Congressional 

Vol.  I.— 13 


194   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

district  every  two  years  work  themselves  into  a  passion 
as  to  whom  they  will  send  to  Washington  to  represent 
them.  The  momentous  first  Tuesday  after  the  first 
Monday  in  November  arrives;  four  hundred  and  thirty- 
five  men  are  elected;  the  sovereigns  discuss  the  figures 
for  a  little  while  and  then  go  their  various  ways,  forgetting 
all  about  it — till  the  next  campaign. 

They  know  in  a  general  sense  what  Congress  does — 
that  is,  what  laws  are  placed  upon  the  statute-books — 
but  most  of  them  have  only  the  haziest  sort  of  idea  as  to 
the  processes  by  which  legislation  is  hastened,  delayed, 
accomplished,  or  defeated,  or  what  part  members  take 
in  the  legislation. 

One  of  two  things  seems  to  be  true:  either  the  great 
body  of  the  people  have  implicit  faith  in  their  representa- 
tives or  do  not  care  what  they  do. 

The  legislative  body  in  every  free  country  is  the  most 
important  of  the  three  branches — legislative,  judicial,  and 
executive.  We  come  from  the  people;  we  represent  the 
people;  we  reflect  the  will  of  the  people;  and  at  short 
intervals  we  return  to  the  people  to  render  an  account  of 
our  stewardship.  I  undertake  to  say,  without  fear  of 
successful  contradiction,  that  when  the  American  people 
make  up  their  minds  that  they  want  a  thing,  the  Congress 
will  grant  it  to  them  as  soon  as  it  finds  out  that  the  people 
desire  it.  The  Congress  of  the  United  States  is  the 
greatest  legislative  body  in  all  history,  and  I  take  pride 
in  that  fact.  Yet  every  evil-disposed  person  in  the  land 
can  find  some  slander  to  utter  about  the  American  Con- 
gress. If  the  House  takes  time  enough  to  discuss  an 
important  measure  these  slanderers  savagely  assail  it  for 
being  too  slow.  If  the  House  puts  in  overtime  and  hurries 
a  bill  through  these  same  malignants  fiercely  denounce  it 
for  sending  half-baked  measures  to  the  Senate.  They 
revel  in  such  foul  wc^k.  For  instance,  the  House  was 
abused  and  denounced  because  we  discussed  for  two  days 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  19s 

instead  of  only  one,  a  bill  providing  for  the  issue  of  seven 
billion  dollars  in  bonds — ^far  and  away  the  biggest  money 
bill  ever  authorized  up  to  that  time.  Think  of  that — in 
two  days!  And  then  remember  that  all  the  property 
in  America — real,  personal,  and  mixed — ^was  estimated 
at  only  sixteen  billion  dollars  in  1861,  when  Sumter  was 
fired  on.  I  hope  and  pray  that  these  impatient  and  pal- 
pitating superpatriots  who  belabored  us  so  savagely  for 
consuming  two  whole  days  in  providing  for  seven  billions 
of  bonds  will  be  equally  impatient  and  anxious  to  get  an 
opportunity  to  help  pay  them  when  due. 

No  right-thinking  man  objects  to  fair,  honest,  intelli- 
gent criticism.  That  is  wholesome  and  altogether  proper, 
but  abuse,  ridicule,  and  slander  are  very  different  things 
from  criticism  and  do  immense  damage,  because  they 
have  a  tendency  to  bring  our  whole  system  of  represent- 
ative government  into  disrepute,  thereby  sapping  its  very 
foundation. 

At  the  very  moment  when  the  country  was  engaged  in 
the  most  stupendous  war  in  all  the  bloody  annals  of  man- 
kind, and  the  Congress  was  doing  its  duty — its  whole 
duty — manfully,  industriously,  and  patriotically,  to  bring 
the  war  to  a  speedy  and  triumphant  conclusion — as  all 
good  citizens  hoped  most  fervently  that  it  might  be 
brought — Representatives  and  Senators  were  abused  like 
a  lot  of  pickpockets.  Representatives  and  Senators  not 
only  voted  unheard-of  sums  of  money  for  the  prosecution 
of  the  war,  but  to  the  limit  of  their  financial  ability  they 
contributed  to  the  cause  by  purchasing  bonds  to  foot  the 
bills,  and  gave  to  the  Red  Cross  and  similar  organizations. 
Representatives  and  Senators  not  only  voted  other  men's 
sons  into  the  army,  but  they  sent  their  own  sons  to  fight — 
perchance  to  die — for  the  starry  banner  of  the  Republic. 

There  is  not  even  a  shadow  of  doubt  that  the  Congress 
voted  every  man  and  ev^ry  dollar  needed  in  the  titanic 
world  struggle  into  which  we  entered,  for  in  the  beginning 


196   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

we  solemnly  pledged  all  the  immense  and  various  resources 
of  this  puissant  nation  in  that  behalf  and  we  faithfully 
kept  that  pledge. 

To  a  close  observer  it  is  clear  that  for  some  years  there 
has  been  a  conspiracy — tacit  or  expressed — among  cer- 
tain newspapers  and  magazines  to  write  the  legislative 
department  down  and  the  executive  department  up. 
The  reason  is  plain — the  executive  department  has  a  vast 
patronage  to  bestow,  while  the  Congress  has  none.  This 
line  of  conduct  by  the  portion  of  the  press  referred  to 
was  not  entered  upon  in  President  Wilson's  administra- 
tion— it  had  been  pursued  for  years,  but  has  grown  con- 
stantly and  rapidly  worse  of  late.  It  is  my  dehberate 
opinion  that  those  writers  who  assail  and  slander  the 
Congress  are  enemies  of  the  Republic,  for  they  must 
know  that  in  so  doing  they  are,  so  far  as  in  them  lies, 
weakening  the  people's  faith  in  a  "government  of  the 
people,  by  the  people,  and  for  the  people." 

These  base  slanderers  of  the  Congress  sometimes  go 
to  such  length  as  to  insinuate  that  large  numbers  of 
Representatives  and  Senators  are  financially  dishonest — 
extending  their  insinuation  so  as  to  include  all  classes  of 
public  men — ^which  is  as  big  a  lie  as  has  been  told  on 
earth  since  Ananias  and  Sapphira  had  that  ill-starred 
land  transaction.  The  fact  that  a  majority  of  public 
men  quit  office  poorer  than  when  they  entered  should  be 
a  sufficient  answer  to  the  wicked  charges  of  these  charac- 
ter-assassins. In  very  recent  days  we  have  seen  three  of 
our  most  prominent  officials — Hon.  John  J.  Fitzgerald 
of  Brooklyn,  chairman  of  the  great  Committee  on  Appro- 
priations, one  of  the  ablest  chairmen  that  committee  ever 
had;  Attorney-General  Thomas  W.  Gregory,  and  Hon. 
William  G.  McAdoo,  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  Director- 
General  of  Railroads,  etc.,  etc. — resign  because  they 
wanted  to  make  some  money  to  take  care  of  their  families 
^nd  to  educ^t^  properl)^  their  ^hiWren,  which  t\\ey  averred 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  197 

they  could  not  do  on  their  government  salaries.  Billions 
of  dollars  went  through  their  fingers  without  one  cent 
sticking.  These  men  are  absolutely  honest,  but  not  one 
whit  more  honest  than  their  fellow-officials.  I  under- 
stand that  Fitzgerald  is  making  fifty  thousand  a  year — 
which  I  hope  is  true — and  I  have  no  doubt  that  Mr. 
Secretary  McAdoo  and  Attorney-General  Gregory  will 
do  as  well — perhaps  better.  Dozens  of  Representatives  re- 
fuse to  stand  for  re-election  because  they  find  good  oppor- 
tunities to  recoup  their  fortunes  in  private  life. 

Another  railing  accusation,  also  false,  is  that  Represent- 
atives and  Senators  spend  much  time  guzzling,  gambling, 
and  in  other  manner  of  riotous  living,  when  as  a  matter 
of  fact  they  do  little  of  that  sort  of  thing.  The  truth  is 
that  a  vast  majority  of  them  are  sober,  serious,  indus- 
trious, intelligent,  capable,  and  patriotic  men,  most  of 
them  discharging  their  religious  duties  more  completely 
in  Washington  than  at  home. 

What  may  surprise  those  prone  to  thmk  evil  is  that 
the  morals  of  public  men  are  better  now  than  in  past 
generations,  and  are  constantly  improving,  which  should 
be  a  matter  of  pride  for  the  American  people. 

The  constant  abuse  of  public  men  is  a  gross  and  Un- 
pardonable outrage.  It  surely  and  inevitably  has  a  most 
deleterious  effect  upon  the  rising  generation.  It  makes 
a  young  man  who  has  an  inclination  toward  public  life 
think  that  to  succeed  therein  he  must  be  corrupt — that 
is,  if  he  believes  these  foul  charges. 

What  effect  must  it  have  on  the  foreigners  who  come 
to  our  shores — because  in  foreign  lands  they  have  been 
taught  that  we  have  the  best  government  under  the  sun — 
to  read  in  the  first  paper  they  see,  upon  landing,  or  hear 
from  the  first  person  with  whom  they  converse,  that  all 
our  public  men  are  semi-idiots  or  rascals?  A  man  does 
not  have  to  be  a  Solomon  to  realize  that  the  effect  is 
wholly  bad,  frequently  demoralizing. 


198   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

For  the  good  of  America — indeed,  for  the  good  of  the 
human  race — for  the  perpetuity  of  the  Repubhc — this 
wholesale  slander  of  public  men  should  cease  at  once  and 
forever. 

The  words  "the  House"  mean  "a  quorum,"  which  in 
turn  means  one  more  than  half  of  the  members  elected, 
sworn  and  living,  and  who  have  not  resigned  or  been 
expelled.  Theoretically  no  business  can  be  transacted 
without  a  quorum  being  present.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
much  business — I  think  I  would  be  within  the  limits  of 
truth  to  say  the  major  portion  of  the  business — is  trans- 
acted without  a  quorum.  That  comes  about  in  this  wise: 
at  the  beginning  of  each  session  the  roll  is  called  to  ascer- 
tain a  quorum.  If  a  quorum  is  developed  it  is  presumed 
to  be  present  during  the  rest  of  the  session,  unless  a  roll- 
call  reveals  the  absence  of  a  quorum  or  unless  some 
member  "raises  the  point  of  no  quorum,"  which  is  the 
constitutional  right.  If  the  roll-call  shows  the  absence 
of  a  quorum,  and  the  Speaker  cannot  eke  out  a  quorum 
by  counting  members  present  and  not  answering  on  roll- 
call,  it  is  his  duty  to  announce  the  fact.  When  the  point 
of  no  quorum  is  raised  it  is  his  duty  to  count  the  members 
present  and  to  announce  the  number.  The  formula  is 
this:  He  states  the  number,  and  says  "a  quorum"  or 
"not  a  quorum,"  as  the  case  may  be.  If  in  either  of  the 
cases  stated  no  quorum  is  present,  then  one  of  two  things 
happens.  An  adjournment  is  taken,  or  a  "call  of  the 
House"  is  ordered,  which  means  that  the  doors  are 
closed,  absentees  are  notified  by  electric  bells,  which  ring 
in  all  the  committee-rooms  and  members'  rooms,  and  the 
roll  is  called  to  see  if  a  quorum  responds.  If  so,  some- 
body moves  "to  dispense  with  further  proceedings  under 
the  call,"  which  motion  being  agreed  to — as  it  usually  is 
— business  is  resumed.  If  not,  an  adjournment  is  had, 
or  the  arrest  of  absent  members  is  ordered,  and  under 
writs  signed  by  the  Speaker  and  attested  by  the  clerk  of 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  199 

the  House  and  the  seal  of  the  House  the  sergeant-at-arms 
and  his  deputies  arrest  all  absentees  they  can  find  and 
bring  them  into  the  House  until  a  quorum  is  secured. 

The  point  of  no  quorum  is  raised  for  various  reasons: 
First,  to  defeat  a  bill  which  some  member  deems  obnox- 
ious— ^and  it  is  a  perfectly  legitimate  way  to  defeat  a  bill; 
second,  because  some  one  is  angered  by  the  proponents 
of  a  bill;  third,  because  some  member  beheves  that  no 
business  should  be  transacted  without  the  presence  of  a 
quorum;  fourth,  because  some  member  who  is  not  op- 
posed to  the  pending  bill  wants  to  kill  time  so  that  some 
other  bill  to  which  he  is  opposed  cannot  be  considered; 
fifth,  because  of  a  desire  for  revenge  for  the  recent  defeat 
of  his  own  pet  measure;  sixth,  because  he  desires  to  annoy 
somebody  else  or  to  show  his  power;  seventh,  because 
he  is  weary  or  hungry  or  has  an  engagement  or  thinks 
the  House  has  sat  long  enough,  and  hopes  by  raising  the 
point  of  no  quorum  to  force  an  adjournment. 

From  the  foregoing  definition  of  a  quorum  it  is  apparent 
that  the  number  constituting  a  quorum  varies  from  time 
to  time.  Under  the  present  apportionment  there  are 
four  hundred  and  thirty-five  Congressional  districts,  and 
a  full  membership  consists  of  four  hundred  and  thirty- 
five  members,  of  which  two  hundred  and  eighteen  make 
a  quorum,  but  no  member-elect  can  participate  in  the 
proceedings  after  the  House  is  organized  unless  he  has 
been  sworn  or  has  affirmed,  as  the  case  may  be.  Only 
those  members  who  belong  to  the  Society  of  Friends 
affirm.  If  there  are  ten  vacancies  a  quorum  consists  of 
two  hundred  and  thirteen  members,  and  so  on,  and  so  on. 

There  was  a  continuous  dispute  as  to  what  members- 
elect  should  be  counted  on  the  quorum  question  until 
Mr.  Speaker  Henderson  rendered  an  elaborate  and  well- 
considered  opinion,  as  heretofore  stated,  "Members- 
elect,  sworn  and  living,  who  have  not  resigned  or  been 
expelled.''     As   Mr.   Speaker  Cannon   and   myself  have 


200   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

both  followed  Mr.  Speaker  Henderson's  ruling,  I  take  it 
that  his  ruling  is  a  finality  on  that  subject  because  the 
House  sets  as  much  store  by  precedents  as  do  the  courts. 
In  passing  it  may  be  stated  that  while  it  has  always  been 
difficult  to  keep  a  quorum  present,  it  has  been  almost 
impossible  since  the  House  office-building  was  erected, 
in  which  each  member  has  a  large  work-room  of  his  own 
and  in  which  he  spends  much  time  in  the  transaction  of 
business  pertaining  to  his  official  duties. 

The  Constitution  of  Missouri  contains  the  wholesome 
provision  that  any  bill,  to  become  a  law,  must  receive 
the  affirmative  vote  on  roll-call  of  a  majority  of  the 
members  of  each  House,  and  be  signed  by  the  Governor. 
The  same  rule  prevails  in  some  other  states. 

When  it  is  shown  that  no  quorum  is  present,  no  motions 
are  in  order  except  to  adjourn  or  to  order  a  call  of  the 
House  together  with  such  subsidiary  motions  as  go  with 
or  grow  out  of  the  motion  for  a  call  of  the  House. 

Until  Thomas  Brackett  Reed,  of  Maine,  became 
Speaker,  when  the  roll  was  called  no  member  was  counted 
as  being  present  unless  he  responded  to  his  name  when 
it  was  called.  The  Republicans  at  the  beginning  of  the 
first  Reed  Congress  had  the  very  small  majority  of  eight 
— not  a  working  majority.  So  the  Democrats  concluded 
to  prevent  RepubHcan  political  legislation  by  remaining 
mute  when  their  names  were  called.  This  went  on  for 
some  time,  till  one  fine  morning  when  Reed  astounded 
them  by  counting  enough  Democrats  who  were  present, 
but  not  answering,  to  constitute  a  quorum  when  added 
to  the  Republicans  who  had  answered. 

At  once  there  rose  so  wild  a  yell 

As  all  the  fiends  from  Heaven  that  fell 

Had  pealed  the  banner  cry  of  Hell. 

The  epithets  hurled  at  Speaker  Reed's  head  went  far, 
far  beyond  the  bounds  of  parliamentary  decoruni.    The 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  201 

bitter  warfare  raged  for  days  and  weeks,  but  In  the  end 
**The  White  Czar,"  as  Senator  John  T.  Morgan,  of  Ala- 
bama, dubbed  him,  prevailed,  and  a  quorum-counting  rule 
has  been  adopted  by  every  Congress  since,  except  the 
Fifty-second,  which  had  such  a  great  Democratic  majority 
that  it  did  not  need  it,  and  the  bitterness  growing  out  of 
Reed's  performance,  on  which  his  fame  must  rest  in  the 
coming  time,  was  still  too  intense  to  permit  a  Democratic 
House  to  adopt  it. 

The  story  briefly  told  is  this:  Quorum-counting,  as  a 
cure  for  the  then  great  and  growing  evil  of  fihbustering, 
had  been  suggested  to  Mr.  Speaker  Colfax  in  the  Thirty- 
eighth  Congress,  but  he  would  have  none  of  it.  It  was 
also  suggested  to  Mr.  Speaker  Blaine.  He  turned  it 
down  in  these  words:  "It  would  be  an  absurdity  for  the 
Chair  to  oppose  his  opinion  to  the  actual  record  of  the 
roll-call.  The  Chair  cannot  declare  a  quorum  except  on 
a  yea  and  nay  vote.  The  moment  you  clothe  your 
Speaker  with  power  to  go  behind  your  roll-call  and  assume 
that  there  is  a  quorum  in  the  hall,  why,  gentlemen,  you 
stand  on  the  very  brink  of  a  volcano."  Thus  two  Re- 
publican speakers  contra.  But  still  worse  for  the  Reed 
contention,  he  had  himself  opposed  quorum-counting, 
once  in  1879,  when  it  was  proposed  by  John  Randolph 
Tucker,  of  Virginia,  an  eminent  constitutional  lawyer  as 
well  as  a  distinguished  Democrat,  and  again  when  Mr. 
Speaker  Keifer  suggested  it  in  the  Forty-seventh  Congress. 
It  is  said  that  necessity  is  the  mother  of  invention,  and 
Mr.  Speaker  Reed  realized  that  he  could  not  do  business 
with  so  small  a  majority  as  eight — which,  however,  was 
soon  increased  to  a  working  majority  by  the  simple 
process  of  throwing  out  enough  Democrats — and  realized 
further  that  with  only  eight  majority  he  could  not,  on 
account  of  sickness  and  unavoidable  absence  of  members, 
be  able  to  muster  a  Republican  quorum.  Therefore  the 
only  way  to  be  certain  of  having  a  quorum  w^s  to  count 


202   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

enough  Democrats  not  voting  to  make  a  quorum,  which 
he  proceeded  to  do,  although  there  was  no  rule  authoriz- 
ing him  so  to  do.  In  fact,  no  rules  were  adopted  by  that 
Congress  until  he  secured  his  working  Republican  major- 
ity. During  the  two  months  when  the  House  had  no 
rules  he  claimed  to  be  acting  under  very  elastic  "general 
parliamentary  law."  Thus  Mr.  Speaker  Reed  achieved 
his  niche  in  the  temple  of  fame.  It  is  said  that  many 
Republican  members  threatened  to  vote  against  the  code 
of  rules  containing  the  quorum-counting  provision.  Sub- 
sequently asked  what  he  would  have  done  had  his  quorum- 
counting  rule  been  defeated,  he  replied:  "I  should  have 
simply  left  the  Chair,  resigned  the  Speakership,  left  the 
House,  and  resigned  my  seat  in  Congress.  If  political 
life  consisted  in  sitting  helplessly  in  the  Speaker's  chair 
and  seeing  the  majority  powerless  to  pass  legislation, 
then  I  had  had  enough  of  it,  and  was  ready  to  step  down 
and  out." 

In  fighting  against  the  throwing  out  of  Democrats  in 
that  Congress,  Charles  Frederick  Crisp,  of  Georgia,  made 
enough  reputation  to  land  himself  in  the  Speaker's  chair 
in  the  Fifty-second  Congress. 

Mr.  Speaker  Reed  claimed  complete  vindication  when 
the  Democratic  House  of  the  Fifty-third  Congress  adopted 
a  quorum-counting  rule,  and  he  was  thoroughly  justified 
by  the  facts. 

Everybody  has  heard  the  expression  "a  wheel  within 
a  wheel,"  and  understands  the  meaning  thereof.  The 
House  of  Representatives  is  composed  of  fifty-eight  wheels 
within  a  wheel.  The  fifty-eight  committees  are  the 
smaller  wheels  within  the  big  wheel,  which  is  the  House 
itself.  Most  of  the  really  hard  and  important  work  is 
done  by  the  committees,  of  which  the  value  is  fully 
realized  only  by  the  members  of  the  House,  by  Senators, 
by  officials,  and  by  those  who  are  in  close  contact  with  the 
Congress  or  by  critical  observers. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  203 

Committee  work  gives  little  reputation  to  the  members 
of  the  committee  except  among  their  fellows,  because 
they,  while  at  their  committee  labors,  are  not  in  the  lime- 
light and  do  not  occupy  the  center  of  the  stage,  except 
in  rare  instances.  But  good  committee  work  leads  to 
promotion. 

A  committee,  having  considered  a  bill  or  resolution, 
presents  its  conclusion  to  the  House,  which  accepts,  re- 
jects, or  amends,  as  it  sees  fit,  with  or  without  debate. 
No  bill  or  joint  resolution  is  considered  or  passed  by  the 
House  without  a  report,  except  in  cases  of  extreme 
emergency. 

Committee  work  is  hard  work,  but  pleasant  where  a 
member  secures  assignment  to  a  committee  which  he 
likes.  When  it  is  remembered  that  there  are  some  thirty 
thousand  bills  and  resolutions  introduced  into  each  Con- 
gress, and  distributed  among  the  committees,  it  is  easy 
to  understand  that  the  committees  never  run  out  of  grist. 
Many  of  the  bills  are  duplicates,  triplicates,  etc.,  of  each 
other;  some  are  of  no  importance,  a  few  are  ridiculous, 
and  some  are  mere  replicas  of  existing  statutes  introduced 
by  mistake  or  through  ignorance;  but  after  these  are 
counted  out  **the  irreducible  minimum,"  to  use  the 
favorite  phrase  of  Capt.  Richmond  Pearson  Hobson,  who 
sank  the  Merrimac,  is  very  large,  and  must  be  considered 
if  time  permits.  At  the  time  the  Titanic  sank  there  were 
scores  and  scores  of  bills  and  resolutions  introduced  for 
the  purpose  of  regulating  ships,  routes,  appliances,  etc. 
On  divers  bills  there  is  no  necessity  for  hearings,  because 
they  are  so  plain  and  simple  that  any  one  can  compre- 
hend their  full  import  at  one  reading,  and  the  advisability 
of  passing  or  not  passing  them  is  so  clear  that  there  is  no 
necessity  for  argument  or  evidence;  but  on  many  others 
hearings  are  absolutely  necessary,  and  in  some  cases  the 
evidence  taken  at  the  hearings  grows  into  several  large 
volumes.     Examples  of  this  sort  of  bills  are  tariff  bills, 


204   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

pure-food  bills,  railroad-rate  bills,  parcel-post  bills,  and 
sundry  other  bills  of  an  intricate  and  important  nature 
or  on  subjects  entirely  new.  Evil-minded  persons  try  to 
make  it  appear  that  these  elaborate  hearings  are  a  mere 
waste  of  time  intended  to  delay  or  thwart  legislation.  No 
doubt  there  have  been  cases  of  that  kind,  but  they  were 
exceptions  and  not  the  rule. 

When  a  committee  has  heard  as  much  of  evidence  and 
argument  as  it  is  willing  to  Hsten  to,  it  takes  up  the  bill 
for  amendment.  As  there  are  twenty-one  members  on 
each  of  the  larger  committees,  it  takes  considerable  time 
for  them  to  talk  it  out  among  themselves  and  come,  if 
possible,  to  a  unanimous  conclusion,  an  exceedingly  de- 
sirable consummation,  for  a  unanimous  report  generally, 
but  not  always,  means  the  passage  of  the  bill  through 
the  House;  whereas,  if  there  is  a  minority  report,  its  pas- 
sage is  endangered,  the  danger  increasing  with  the  num- 
ber of  members  who  sign  the  minority's  report. 

Where  a  committee  unanimously  reports  a  bill  it  is 
very  hard  indeed  to  defeat  it  on  the  floor  of  the  House, 
because  in  the  very  nature  of  things  it  is  impossible  for 
every  member  to  investigate  every  bill,  and,  having  faith 
in  the  intelligence,  capacity,  and  integrity  of  the  members 
of  the  committee,  they  are  much  inclined  to  accept  its 
conclusions.  This  is  particularly  true  where  the  bill  is 
on  a  subject  on  which  there  has  been  much  legislation, 
but  when  a  bill  proposes  legislation  on  a  new  subject, 
especially  where  a  new  principle  is  involved,  members 
are  much  slower  about  accepting  the  findings  of  a  com- 
mittee. Again,  the  House  may  in  a  general  way  be  in 
favor  of  legislation  upon  a  given  subject,  but  opposed 
in  toto  to  the  bill  reported  by  the  committee,  or,  what  is 
more  common,  opposed  to  certain  of  its  provisions.  In 
such  cases  the  members  of  the  committee  advocating  the 
bill  are  vigorously  and  elaborately  cross-examined,  and 
amendments  of  all  sorts  are  proposed. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  205 

In  rare  instances  a  bill,  after  discussion  and  amend- 
ment, is  recommitted  without  instructions — which  kills 
it.  More  frequently  it  is  recommitted  to  the  committee 
which  reported  it,  with  instructions  to  incorporate  into 
it  certain  propositions  and  to  report  it  back  at  some  fixed 
time — usually  ** forthwith."  In  order  to  preserve  this 
privilege  inviolate,  the  rules  provide  specifically  that  one 
motion  to  recommit  with  or  without  instructions  is  in 
order  on  every  bill  and  that  in  recognition  for  that  pur- 
pose the  Speaker  shall  give  preference  to  the  opponents 
of  the  bill.  The  reason  for  that  rule  is  that  when  there 
is  a  great  bill  to  be  finally  voted  on  there  is  a  much  fuller 
attendance  of  members  than  during  the  period  of  debate 
and  amendment.  Consequently,  a  proposition  which 
cannot  be  forced  into  a  bill  during  the  amendment  stage 
in  a  thin  House  may  be  forced  in  by  the  fuller  vote  on  the 
motion  to  recommit  with  instructions.  Only  one  motion 
to  recommit  is  in  order,  and  it  is  made  after  the  engross- 
ment and  third  reading.  The  motion  to  recommit  with 
instructions  is  generally  made  for  the  purpose  of  putting 
members  on  record  on  roll-call. 

From  the  foregoing  statement  it  is  easily  seen  that  in 
reality  the  bulk  of  legislation  is  done  in  the  committees. 
That  is  one  reason  why  members  fight  tooth  and  nail  to 
secure  membership  on  the  more  important  committees. 
Another  reason  is  that  being  on  an  important  committee 
gives  them  the  right  to  manage  important  bills  on  the 
floor,  where  reputations  are  made. 

By  reason  of  these  struggles  for  the  choicest  committee 
assignments  there  is  much  jealousy,  heartburning — even 
bitter  hatred — and  a  consuming  desire  for  revenge. 

It  has  been  repeatedly  stated  that  one  reason  why 
James  Gillespie  Blaine  was  defeated  for  the  presidential 
nomination  at  Cincinnati,  in  1876,  was  that  Representa- 
tive Tyner,  of  Indiana,  claimed  that  Blame  as  candidate 
for  Speaker  had  proqiised  hini  the  chairmanship  of  the 


r 


206   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

great  Committee  on  Post-offices  and  Post-roads,  in  ex- 
change for  Tyner's  support  for  him  for  Speaker,  and 
failed  to  keep  his  word.  Consequently  he  knifed  "The 
Plumed  Knight." 

In  popular  estimation,  since  the  foundation  of  the  gov- 
ernment, the  four  great  committees  are  and  have  been. 
Ways  and  Means,  Appropriations,  Judiciary,  and  Foreign 
Affairs. 

At  first  the  Committee  on  Ways  and  Means  also  dis- 
charged the  duties  and  functions  of  the  Committee  on 
Appropriations.  Finally  the  work  became  too  heavy 
and  the  Committee  on  Appropriations  was  created. 
For  many  years  that  committee  had  charge  of  all  appro- 
priations. 

Another  reason  for  creating  the  Committee  on  Appro- 
priations was  that  the  health  of  Thaddeus  Stevens,  of 
Pennsylvania,  who  was  boss  of  the  House  at  that  time 
as  well  as  chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Ways  and 
Means,  was  rapidly  failing,  and  he  desired  to  be  relieved 
of  part  of  his  labor.  Of  his  own  choice  he  became  chair- 
man of  the  new  Committee  on  Appropriations,  and  he 
held  that  position  as  long  as  he  lived. 

.When  Samuel  J.  Randall,  chairman  of  the  Appropria- 
tions Committee,  broke  away  from  the  main  body  of 
Democrats  on  the  tariff,  they,  not  desiring  to  demote  him, 
determined  to  shear  him  of  a  large  part  of  his  power  by 
giving  authority  to  half  a  dozen  other  committees  to  report 
appropriation  bills.  An  effort  is  now  being  made  to  create 
a  Budget  Committee,  after  the  British  fashion,  which  it 
is  purposed  shall  first  determine  the  total  of  appropria- 
tions for  the  fiscal  year  and  then  decide  how  much  shall 
be  appropriated  by  the  various  committees  authorized 
to  report  appropriation  bills.  The  proposition  was  de- 
feated in  the  one  caucus  to  which  it  has  been  presented, 
not  because  members  were  opposed  to  the  budget  idea, 
but  because  they  were  opposed  to  some  of  the  details. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  207 

It  will  probably  be  presented  again  in  revised  form  and 
may  be  adopted  in  some  shape.     The  argument  in  its    | 
favor  is  economy.  — { 

Notwithstanding  the  fact  that  the  Committee  on  Ways 
and  Means  has  little  work  to  do  except  when  questions 
touching  revenue  are  to  the  fore,  the  probabilities  are 
that  it  will  always  be  rated  as  the  premier  committee  of 
the  House — certainly  so  if  it  continues  to  be  a  committee 
on  committees. 

Of  almost  equal  rank,  dignity,  and  power  with  the 
aforementioned  committees  are  the  committees  on  Inter- 
state and  Foreign  Commerce,  Post-offices  and  Post- 
roads,  Military  Affairs,  Naval  Affairs,  Public  Buildings 
and  Grounds,  and  Rivers  and  Harbors.  While  I  am 
neither  a  prophet  nor  the  son  of  a  prophet,  I  make  bold 
to  predict  that,  at  their  present  rate  of  growth,  in  ten  or 
fifteen  years  the  committees  on  Interstate  and  Foreign 
Commerce,  and  Post-offices  and  Post-roads  will  be  the 
most  powerful  and  most  sought-after  committees  in  the 
House.  The  physical  inventions  of  our  times,  as  well 
as  our  increasing  population  and  wealth,  are  constantly 
augmenting  the  business  of  those  two  committees. 

Occasionally  service  on  one  of  the  minor  committees 
gives  a  man  of  parts  opportunity  to  make  a  great  reputa- 
tion. When  Joseph  C.  S.  Blackburn,  of  Kentucky,  first 
entered  the  House  he  was  assigned  to  the  Committee  on 
Expenditures  in  the  War  Department.  His  golden  op- 
portunity came  when  he  discovered  and  dragged  to  light 
of  day  the  peculations  of  Gen.  W.  W.  Belknap,  Secretary 
of  War.  In  the  twinkling  of  an  eye  he  made  reputation 
enough  to  enable  him  to  come  within  two  votes  of  defeat- 
ing Speaker  Randall  for  renomination  to  the  Speaker- 
ship— to  elect  him  to  the  Senate  for  eighteen  years,  and 
to  make  him  Governor  of  the  Canal  Zone. 

Of  course  the  Committee  on  Rules  is  a  committee  of 
great  power  and  dignity,  but  as  its  functions  are  not 


2o8   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

legislative  I  did  not  place  it  in  the  foregoing  list.  Its 
chief  function  is  to  expedite  desirable  or  necessary  legis- 
lation, by  bringing  in  special  rules  providing  for  the  con- 
sideration out  of  order  of  bills  esteemed  important. 

On  account  of  taste  or  local  environment  some  members 
prefer  to  be  on  committees  of  less  general  importance 
than  those  named  above. 

Reputation,  so  far  as  the  public  is  concerned,  is  made 
on  the  floor  of  the  House.  Some  of  the  most  frequent 
debaters  are  very  remiss  in  committee  work.  The  House 
Rules  constitute  an  intricate  and  elaborate  machine, 
most  delicately  adjusted  for  results.  Some  members 
come  to  understand  them  speedily  and  others  never  learn 
them.  As  it  stands  to-day  it  is  the  outcome  of  centuries 
of  experience  in  the  British  House  of  Commons  and  of 
one  hundred  and  thirty  years  in  our  Congress.  It  is  not 
perfect.  Nothing  created  by  man  is  perfect,  but  it  is 
gradually,  if  slowly,  approximating  perfection. 

Some  very  good  people  think  committees  should  be 
abolished  utterly,  which  is  absurd.  Without  them  the 
House  would  get  nowhere — ^would  accomplish  nothing. 
The  "town  meeting"  plan  of  legislating  was  one  potent 
cause  of  the  downfall  of  Poland.  If  one  member  of  the 
PoHsh  Diet  shouted  **  Nie  potszvallam,'*  that  was  the  end 
of  the  measure  under  consideration,  and  by  that  practice 
the  Diet  was  paralyzed.  Let  us  hope  that  in  the  resur- 
rected Poland  the  *'Nie  potswallam'*  theory  will  not  be 
practised.     It  was  called  *' Liber  veto** — free  veto. 

There  are  periodic  outbursts  against  making  up  the 
committees  by  the  rule  of  seniority.  The  crusade  against 
that  practice  was  extremely  vehement  and  virulent  in 
the  campaign  of  191 8 — being  nothing  more  than  part  of 
the  Republican  scheme  to  secure  control  of  the  House. 

There  was  absolutely  no  sincerity  in  the  cry  except 
among  a  few  theorists  who,  as  St.  Paul  said  of  the  Greeks 
on  Mar's  Hill,  "were  always  seeking  something  new.*' 


AMERICAN   POLITICS  ;:io9 

The  utter  hypocrisy  of  the  whole  performance  is  demon- 
strated beyond  cavil  by  the  RepubHcans  as  soon  as  they 
got  in,  making  up  their  committees  largely  by  the  same 
rule  of  seniority  which  they  so  savagely  condemned  in 
1918. 

Of  course  no  party  wdl  ever  make  committees  solely 
by  the  rule  of  seniority — ^which  would  be  exceedingly 
unwise  and  would  end  in  disaster — but  that  seniority 
always  has  been  and  always  will  be  an  important  factor 
in  making  committee  assignments  is  absolutely  certain 
and  no  mortal  man  can  give  any  philosophic  or  tenable 
reason  why  it  should  not  be.  Other  things  being  equal, 
why  should  not  length  of  service  count  in  a  member's 
favor?  It  is  practised  to  some  extent  not  only  in  the 
House,  but  in  all  the  affairs  of  life.  No  sane  man  would 
for  one  moment  think  of  making  a  new  graduate  from 
West  Point  a  full  general,  or  one  from  Annapolis  an 
admiral,  or  one  from  any  university  or  college  chief  of  a 
great  newspaper,  magazine,  or  business  house.  A  priest 
or  preacher  who  has  just  taken  orders  is  not  immediately 
made  a  bishop,  archbishop,  or  cardinal.  In  every  walk 
of  life  men  "must  tarry  at  Jericho  till  their  beards  are 
grown." 

Even  the  Fathers  of  the  Republic  practised  the  rule  of 
seniority  when  they  wrote  in  the  Constitution  the  pro- 
vision that  no  man  is  eligible  to  the  Presidency  unless  he 
is  at  least  thirty-five  years  old;  or  to  the  Senate  before 
he  is  thirty;  or  to  the  House  of  Representatives  before 
he  is  twenty-five. 

The  rule  of  seniority  cannot  keep  down  a  man  of 
great  parts  in  any  department  of  human  endeavor. 
Napoleon  was  commander  of  the  army  of  Italy  at  twenty- 
seven.  Gen.  Leonard  Wood  and  Gen.  John  J.  Pershing 
were  promoted  over  hundreds  of  their  seniors.  R.  M.  T. 
Hunter,  of  Virginia,  was  elected  Speaker  at  the  early  age  of 
thirty,  and  Henry  Clay  at  thirty-four.     President  Lin- 

VoL.  I.— 14 


210   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

coin  made  Grant  lieutenant-general  of  all  our  armies, 
bouncing  him  over  the  heads  of  a  score  of  major-generals 
whose  commissions  were  senior  to  his.  Indeed,  the  Con- 
gress resurrected  the  rank  of  lieutenant-general  for  the 
sole  purpose  of  enabling  President  Lincoln  to  bestow  it 
on  Grant. 

When  Stephen  Arnold  Douglas  entered  the  Senate  at 
the  age  of  thirty-four  he  had  already  been  circuit  attor- 
ney, member  of  the  lUinois  Legislature,  Registrar  of  the 
Land  Office,  Secretary  of  State,  judge  of  the  State  Su- 
preme Court,  and  member  of  the  Federal  House  of 
Representatives.  In  six  years'  service  in  the  House 
John  C.  Breckenridge  made  himself  leader  of  the  pro- 
slavery  Democrats. 

Those  who  make  up  the  committees  find  ways  of  pro- 
moting men  of  extraordinary  merit  over  their  seniors, 
and  it  will  be  so  to  the  end  of  time. 

'* Gallia  est  omnis  divisa  in  partes  tres**  are  the  opening 
words  of  Caesar's  Commentaries,  familiar  to  the  eyes  and 
ears  of  every  boy  and  man  and  every  girl  and  woman  that 
has  ever  wrestled  with  Latin.  In  passing  it  may  be 
truly  stated  that  when  Caesar  took  his  stylus  in  hand  to 
write  an  account  of  his  battles  and  campaigns  he  did  far 
more  to  achieve  earthly  immortality  than  by  winning  his 
victories. 

Even  as  the  great  Imperator  divided  Gaul  into  three 
parts,  the  duties  of  Senators  and  Representatives  in  Con- 
gress may  be  roughly  divided  into  three  parts:  first,  floor 
work;  second,  committee  work;  third,  departmental  work. 

So  far  as  the  general  public  is  concerned,  the  floor  work 
IS  the  most  important.  It  is  the  showiest,  and  from  it 
and  by  it  most  Representatives  and  Senators  make  their 
reputations  both  with  the  newspapers  and  the  public. 
The  average  reader  will  be  surprised  to  know  that  with 
many  Senators  and  Representatives  the  floor  work  is  the 
easiest  work.     It  goes  without  saying  that  much  labor 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  211 

and  research  are  bestowed  upon  the  speeches  in  House  or 
Senate  which  attract  attention  and  really  influence  the 
course  of  legislation  and  public  opinion.  But  speech- 
making  is  such  a  facile  performance  with  Americans  that 
to  stand  on  his  feet  and  talk  is  easy  for  the  average  Sena- 
tor or  Representative. 

Committee  work  is  hard,  important,  and  pleasant,  pro- 
vided the  Senator  or  Representative  is  assigned  to  one  of 
the  great  committees — particularly  if  the  work  is  congenial. 
For  instance,  long  service  on  the  Committee  on  Ways 
and  Means  in  the  House  or  the  Finance  Committee  in 
the  Senate,  which  discharges  among  other  things  part  of 
the  functions  of  the  House  Ways  and  Means  Committee, 
is  a  liberal  education.  Sooner  or  later  every  class  of  our 
citizens,  except  fools,  is  heard  before  those  committees; 
men  of  fine  ability  and  more  or  less  thoroughly  posted  on 
the  questions  involved — great  lawyers,  editors,  manu- 
facturers, railroad  men,  merchants,  artists,  authors,  farm- 
ers, labor  leaders,  importers,  exporters,  etc.,  etc.  They 
come  to  enlighten  the  committees  and  some  of  them 
depart  very  much  enlightened  themselves.  Battles  royal 
take  place  in  those  committees.  Some  men  appear  there 
with  carefully  prepared  statements  or  arguments,  half 
false,  which  smell  of  the  midnight  lamp — and  which  they 
and  their  employers  fondly  hope  would  deceive  the  very 
elect.  They  enter  the  committee-room,  intent  upon  and 
confident  of  pulling  the  wool  over  the  eyes  of  the  commit- 
teemen. Generally  they  come  to  grief,  their  falsehoods 
are  exposed,  their  carefully  prepared  stories  are  chopped 
to  pieces  ruthlessly,  and  they  go  thence  after  the  fashion 
of  little  Bo-peep's  sheep,  dragging  their  tails  behind  them. 

These  smug  knaves,  however,  are  the  exceptions  to  the 
tule,  for  most  of  the  men  appearing  before  the  commit- 
tees to  express  their  views  for  or  against  pending  meas- 
ures are  honest.  Such  men  are  treated  courteously  and 
they  are  heard  gladly. 


212   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

For  example,  when  Charles  M.  Schwab  testified  before 
the  Committee  on  Ways  and  Means — on  which  committee 
I  was  the  top  Democrat  during  the  hearings  on  the  Payne 
Tariff  bill — I  cross-examined  him  for  two  hours,  and 
when  the  committee  adjourned  he  waited  for  me  and  said : 

"Mr.  Clark,  I  want  to  thank  you  for  the  kindly  way 
in  which  you  treated  me,  for  I  had  been  told  that  you 
went  after  witnesses  with  a  meat-ax  and  figuratively 
chopped  them  to  pieces." 

I  replied:  **You  seemed  to  be  trying  to  tell  the  truth, 
answering  fairly  all  questions  propounded  to  you.  My 
meat-ax  is  used  only  on  liars  and  dodgers." 

All  in  all,  the  departmental  work  is  hardest.  Repre- 
sentatives, Senators,  and  newspaper  men  call  it  "doing 
the  chores."  Much  senseless  humor  is  poked  at  it.  It 
consists  in  looking  after  the  business  of  one's  constituents, 
of  whom  each  Representative,  on  the  average,  has  two 
hundred  and  twelve  thousand  five  hundred,  and  each 
Senator  half  a  state  full.  It  is  flat  drudgery.  Some 
Representatives  and  Senators  do  it  cheerfully  and  suc- 
cessfully; others  irritably  and  grudgingly;  a  few  not  at 
all.  It  seems  to  me  that  this  work  is  a  necessary  portion 
of  the  duties  of  members  of  House  and  Senate.  At  any 
rate,  I  have  always  done  it  as  best  I  could.  It  is  utterly 
impossible  to  catalogue  the  things  folks  want  looked  after. 
They  range  all  the  way  from  the  smallest  and  most 
trifling  inquiries  to  inquiries  touching  fabulous,  fanciful, 
and  colossal  fortunes  in  Europe.  The  business  of  hum- 
bugging the  American  people  and  swindHng  them  out  of 
their  hard-earned  dollars  and  dimes  by  means  of  bogus 
fortunes,  in  Europe,  is  systematically  carried  on  by 
certain  law  firms  in  London  and  perhaps  in  other  Euro- 
pean cities,  co-operating  with  certain  law  firms  in  New 
York.  This  swindle  was  a  great  nuisance  to  Senators, 
Representatives,  and  the  State  Department,  entailing 
much  useless  labor^  until  finally  the  State  Department 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  213 

published  an  elaborate  circular  exposing  the  thievish 
game,  which  it  keeps  in  stock  and  furnishes  to  Represent- 
atives, Senators,  and  others,  on  request.  This  has  done 
much  to  mitigate  the  evil  and  reduce  the  labor  attached 
thereto,  but  it  has  not  stopped  it.  Thomas  Carlyle,  in  a 
fit  of  anger  which  appears  to  have  been  his  normal  con- 
dition, once  said:  "There  are  thirty  millions  of  people  in 
Great  Britain — mostly  fools!"  While  the  percentage  of 
fools  in  this  country  is  not  so  large,  there  are  still  enough 
to  fatten  the  swindlers,  who  pretend  to  discover  tremen- 
dous fortunes  in  Europe  which  belong  to  American  suck- 
ers— of  whom  the  late  lamented  Phineas  T.  Barnum  de- 
clared "One  is  born  every  minute."  Phineas  T.  places 
the  birth-rate  too  low.  One  every  second  would  have 
been  nearer  the  mark,  but  even  that  would  have  been  too 
low — much  too  low.  These  swindlers  always  select  a 
name  widely  disseminated,  such  as  Smith,  Jones,  Brown, 
WilUams,  Fisher,  Ball,  Clark,  etc.,  and  reap  a  rich  harvest. 
The  percentage  of  fools  in  this  country  is  not  so  great  as 
Carlyle  states  it,  but  nevertheless  it  is  quite  large. 

Here  are  samples  of  "Congressional  chores."  It  so 
happens  that  for  women  to  become  members  of  "The 
Dames  of  '76"  or  "The  Daughters  of  the  Revolution," 
they  must  prove  up  a  Revolutionary  pedigree  straight  as 
a  string.  So  when  those  two  great  patriotic  organizations 
spread  over  the  Mississippi  Valley,  every  woman,  the 
traditions  of  whose  family  led  her  to  believe  that  any  of 
her  ancestors  fought  in  the  Revolutionary  War,  inevitably 
and  very  properly  desired  to  join,  and  just  as  inevitably 
and  properly  had  to  produce  her  pedigree  papers  in  due 
form  as  a  sine  qua  non.  Consequently  some  four  or  five 
hundred  applied  to  me  for  the  necessary  documents,  and 
through  my  very  efficient  secretary,  Wallace  D.  Bassford, 
I  applied  to  the  Secretaries  of  War  and  the  Navy  and  to 
the  keepers  of  the  archives  of  most  of  the  Original  Thir- 
teen States,  as  well  as  of  Kentucky  and  Tennessee — the 


214   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

population  of  Missouri  being  very  cosmopolitan  in  char- 
acter. To  me  it  was  a  labor  of  love.  What  it  was  to  my 
secretary,  Doctor  Bassford,  who  did  most  of  the  work, 
this  deponent  sayeth  not. 

Of  course,  looking  after  pension  claims  and  private 
claims  for  property  lost,  injured,  destroyed,  or  confiscated 
through  government  officers,  agents,  or  laborers,  soon 
becomes  a  confirmed  habit  with  Representatives  and 
Senators.  Claims  to  the  astounding  amount  of  four 
billions  of  dollars  are  pending  in  Washington — a  majority 
of  them,  perhaps,  more  or  less  meritorious.  There  are 
thousands  and  thousands  of  honest  claims  for  property 
taken  or  destroyed  or  injured  which  have  never  been 
made.  Uncle  Sam  is  such  a  slow  paymaster  and  the 
process  is  so  long  and  wearisome  that  many  persons  never 
present  their  claims  at  all,  preferring  the  loss  to  the  worry 
of  collecting  their  just  dues. 

A  government  claim  once  made  is  immortal.  The  only 
way  to  get  rid  of  one  is  to  pay  it,  and  even  that  does  not 
always  put  an  end  to  it.  Age  does  not  wither  claims  or 
diminish  their  infinite  variety.  They  come  down  from 
pre-Revolutionary  days.  Like  Tennyson's  brook,  they 
go  on  forever. 

During  my  first  term  in  Congress  some  of  Harman 
Blennerhasset's  descendants  who  live  in  my  district 
wrote  me  concerning  a  claim  which  they  and  others  had 
against  the  government  by  reason  of  damage  to  their 
celebrated  ancestor's  property  on  Blennerhasset's  Island 
during  the  days  of  the  Aaron  Burr  hysteria — particularly 
for  the  destruction  of  fruit-trees  and  shrubbery — that 
shrubbery  which,  according  to  the  perfervid  eloquence 
of  WiUiam  Wirt,  Shenstone  would  have  envied.  Being 
much  interested  in  the  Burr  episode,  having  read  every- 
thing ever  printed  about  him,  having  declaimed,  when  a 
boy,  Wirt's  magnificent  philippic,  which  immortalized 
both  himself  and  Blennerhasset,  having  delivered  a  lect- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  215 

ure  on  him  frequently,  and  supposing,  of  course — being 
a  green  hand  at  the  bellows — that  the  claim  had  never 
been  presented  before,  I  went  at  the  investigation  with 
much  energy  and  enthusiasm.  I  was  anxious  to  win  my 
spurs  as  a  vigilant  and  effective  representative  of  my 
constituents.  For  days,  and  even  weeks,  I  put  in  all 
the  time  I  could  spare  from  my  larger  duties  delving  into 
the  journals  of  House  and  Senate.  Finally  I  discovered 
that  in  181 2  some  Senator  had  introduced  a  bill  providing 
for  the  payment  of  this  same  Blennerhasset  claim,  that 
a  committee  was  appointed  to  investigate  and  report  on 
the  same.  All  of  which  was  done.  The  report,  a  long, 
comprehensive  one  of  twelve  or  fifteen  pages  of  fine  print, 
recited  the  damage,  which  was  unquestionable  and  of 
considerable  amount,  but  found  further  that  the  damage 
was  wrought  by  the  Virginia  militia  not  acting  under  the 
authority  or  by  order  of  the  government  of  the  United 
States,  and  therefore  the  state  of  Virginia,  and  not  the 
Federal  government,  was  responsible  in  damages  to  the 
heirs-at-law  of  Harman  Blennerhasset. 

Some  years  ago  a  man  in  Wisconsin,  of  whom  I  had 
never  heard,  wrote  me  to  send  him  at  once,  by  return 
mail,  a  copy  of  all  the  Congressional  Globes  and  Records 
from  the  foundation  of  the  government  to  the  day  when 
he  wrote  me.  I  answered  that  I  could  not  possibly  do 
it,  as  I  had  been  trying  for  years  to  save  up  the  seven  or 
eight  hundred  dollars  which  they  would  cost  in  order  to 
buy  a  set  for  myself — which  was  the  literal  truth.  They 
do  cost  seven  or  eight  hundred  dollars  and  I  was  very 
anxious  to  own  a  complete  set,  as  they  are  well-nigh  in- 
valuable to  a  public  man  who  is  interested  in  the  legisla- 
tive and  political  history  of  the  country.  Five  or  six 
years  ago  a  queer  thing  happened.  An  attache  of  the 
House  came  to  me  and  asked  how  I  would  like  to  have 
a  full  set  bound  in  turkey  morocco.  I  told  him  how 
glad  I  would  be  and  inquired  the  cost.     He  repHed,  "Not 


2i6   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

a  cent;  I  found  three  sets  in  the  basement,  left  there  by 
some  unknown  Congressman  ten  years  ago.  You  are 
welcome  to  one  set!''  I  offered  to  make  him  a  nice 
present,  but  he  would  not  accept  any.  I  esteem  the 
books  very  highly. 

When  I  was  a  boy  back  in  the  hill  country  of  Kentucky, 
attending  the  old  log-cabin  school-house,  with  slabs  for 
seats,  the  teacher  was  fond  of  setting  us  this  copy:  "Many 
men  of  many  minds.'*  To  suit  the  exigencies  of  this  case 
it  might  be  changed  to:  "Many  requests  by  many  people." 
In  1894  one  of  my  friends  wrote  me,  while  I  was  busy  in 
Washington  with  my  Congressional  duties,  that  he  wanted 
me  to  prepare  him,  at  once,  two  humorous  lectures,  each 
one  hour  and  a  half  long,  which  he  proposed  to  deliver 
over  the  country  for  pay.  I  answered  him  that  I  was 
very  much  crowded  for  time,  and,  anyway,  a  man  could 
not  write  lectures  by  the  yard  at  any  time  as  he  would 
sell  calico  or  cotton  cloth,  but  he  had  to  wait  for  the 
spirit  to  move  him.  It  is  said  that  Dr.  Samuel  Johnson 
wrote  Rasselas  at  one  sitting  in  order  to  make  money 
enough  to  pay  his  mother's  funeral  expenses — but  there 
are  not  many  Doctor  Johnsons,  and  few  men  can  rival 
the  literary  feats  of  the  Ursa  Major. 

Not  long  since  I  received  a  long  letter  from  a  worthy 
woman  in  a  small  town  in  Pennsylvania — a  total  stranger 
— who  wanted  me  to  send  her  money  enough  to  put  up  a 
fence  of  wire-netting  around  her  premises  to  restrain  her 
ducks,  geese,  and  chickens  from  foraging  on  her  neighbors. 
Clearly  her  heart  was  in  the  right  place  and  she  aspired 
to  be  neighborly  in  the  best  sense,  but  as  the  balance  was 
on  the  wrong  side  in  my  bank-account  at  that  time,  I 
failed  to  send  her  the  desired  remittance. 

Another  Member  of  that  Congress  was  Thomas  Corwin, 
of  Ohio,  who  had  been  United  States  Senator  and  Gov- 
ernor and  a  member  of  the  Cabinet,  and  who  subse- 
quently was  Minister  to  Mexico, 


>;^:^P^S^  vPe»'^  't  4. 


CHAMP   CLARK  AT  THE    AGE    OF  TWENTY-NINE 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  217 

About  that  time  a  patriotic  brother,  with  an  eye  to  the 
main  chance,  wrote  me  a  most  affectionate  epistle,  laud- 
ing me  to  the  skies  and  winding  up  by  offering  to  sell  me 
a  well-preserved  hickory  stick  once  carried  by  Georgia's 
renowned  statesman,  Alexander  Hamilton  Stephens,  for 
the  modest  sum  of  fifty  dollars — ^which  offer  I  was  com- 
pelled to  decline  for  the  lack  of  funds. 

Another  prolific  source  of  "chores"  for  Representa- 
tives and  Senators  is  helping  boys  into  the  army  and 
navy  or  in  helping  them  out.  Applications  to  get  out 
are  much  more  numerous  than  applications  to  get  in. 
During  the  Spanish-American  War  I  put  in  a  large  por- 
tion of  my  time  for  three  months  getting  them  in  and  for 
six  months  getting  them  out.  Of  course  applications  of 
this  sort  piled  up  sky-high  during  and  subsequent  to  the 
World  War.  Senators  and  Representatives  do  the  best 
possible  in  these  cases. 

Boys  away  from  home  "go  broke,"  can  find  no  employ- 
ment, and  as  a  dernier  ressort  enlist  in  the  army  or  navy. 
The  flaming  multicolored  posters  which  everywhere  meet 
the  eye  lure  many  a  boy  into  enlisting.  Many  of  them 
soon  grow  weary  of  the  hard  work,  monotony,  and  strict 
discipline.  They  write  home  letters  in  the  nature  of 
jeremiads.  Then  the  mother  and  father  appeal  to 
their  Representative  or  Senator  to  help  get  him  a  release 
from  the  service  because  he  was  under  age  when  he 
enlisted  and  that  they  did  not  give  their  consent,  or  that 
mother  or  father  is  sick  and  needs  his  labor,  etc.,  etc. 
Frequently  a  youngster,  homesick  and  heartsick,  deserts, 
and  then  the  appeals  to  Representatives  and  Senators  to 
save  the  delinquents  from  punishment  and  disgrace  are 
heartrending.  Saving  them  is  difficult — generally  im- 
possible— for  desertions  are  so  much  the  fashion  that 
army  and  navy  officers  and  war  and  navy  departmental 
officials  are  loath  to  aid  in  reducing  the  punishment,  not 
from  hardness  of  hearty  but  because  of  th^  demoralize' 


2i8   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

tion  which  letting  deserters  off  scot-free  would  work  in 
the  service. 

In  this  connection  it  is  apropos  to  state  that  while 
desertions  are  amazingly  numerous,  the  number  of  in- 
stances where  men  re-enlist  are  still  more  numerous. 
The  re-enlisted  men  get  better  pay,  have  a  good  chance 
to  become  non-commissioned  officers  and  a  very  long 
chance  to  win  commissions,  but  the  chief  reason  why 
they  re-enlist  is  that  they  have  become  habituated  to 
the  service  and  prefer  it,  with  a  certain  living  attached, 
to  getting  out  and  entering  into  what  the  late  Mr.  Man- 
talini  would  have  denominated  "the  demnition,  horrid 
grind  "  of  competing  with  the  vast  jostling  multitude  for 
"a  place  in  the  sun,"  to  borrow  the  Kaiser's  famous 
phrase. 

A  distinguished  army  officer  told  me  not  long  since 
that  should  Congress  increase  the  regular  army  to  any 
considerable  extent  the  trouble  would  be  to  secure  the 
necessary  enlistments  in  good  times,  but  that  it  would 
not  be  so  difficult  to  secure  enough  in  hard  times. 

At  any  rate,  the  double  process  of  getting  youngsters 
into  the  army  and  navy  and  of  getting  them  out  gives 
Representatives  and  Senators  considerable  extra  work 
to  do. 

Hon.  Amos  J.  Cummings,  brilliant  both  as  a  Congress- 
man and  journalist,  filibusterer  under  Walker  in  Nica- 
ragua, soldier  in  the  Army  of  the  Potomac  under  McClel- 
lan,  whom  he  idolized,  disciple  of  Horace  Greeley,  whose 
outr^  and  bizarre  utterances  he  was  always  quoting, 
figured  it  out  that  the  average  length  of  service  of  a 
Representative  in  Congress  is  only  four  years.  One  of 
two  things  is  true:  either  Amos  was  wrong  or  the  average 
length  of  service  has  been  increased  in  recent  years,  for 
since  I  entered  the  House,  March  4,  1893,  the  average  is 
somewhat  over  seven  years.  Undoubtedly  the  tendency 
is  toward  longer  service. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  219 

During  the  twenty-five  years  I  have  been  in  Congress 
only  three  ex-United  States  Senators  have  been  members 
of  the  House — Henry  W.  Blair,  of  New  Hampshire, 
Charles  A.  Town,  formerly  of  Minnesota,  now  of  New 
York,  and  WiUiam  E.  Mason,  of  IlHnois,  now  a  Repre- 
sentative— but  there  has  been  a  constant  procession  of 
House  members  to  the  Senate.  So  it  has  been  from  the 
beginning.  Out  of  ninety-six  Senators  at  the  present 
time,  thirty-four  are  ex-Representatives.  It  may  be  of 
interest  to  state  that  twenty-two  Senators  are  ex-Govern- 
ors, and  that  ten  have  been  both  Representatives  in  Con- 
gress and  Governors.  More  ex-Governors  than  ex-Sena- 
tors come  into  the  House.  I  have  served  with  three 
ex-Governors  of  Maine — Dingley,  Burleigh,  and  Powers; 
with  one,  McCreary,  from  Kentucky.  At  the  present 
time  there  are  two  ex-Governors  in  the  House — Montague, 
of  Virginia,  and  Sanders,  of  Louisiana.  Once  in  a  long 
while  an  ex-Cabinet  Minister  is  elected  a  Representative. 
In  his  Twenty  Years  of  Congress  James  G.  Blaine  says  that 
David  Davis,  of  Illinois,  was  the  only  ex-Justice  of  the 
Federal  Supreme  Court  to  serve  in  the  Senate,  and  John 
Rutledge,  of  South  Carolina,  the  only  one  to  serve  in  the 
House.  Rutledge  had  also  been  Chief  Justice.  Every- 
body knows  that  John  Quincy  Adams  was  the  only  ex- 
President  to  serve  in  the  House,  while  Andrew  Johnson 
was  the  only  one  to  serve  in  the  Senate.  In  1861  Ken- 
tucky sent  to  the  House  two  veteran  statesmen,  John  J. 
Crittenden  and  Charles  A.  WicklifF.  The  former  has  been 
Governor,  United  States  Senator,  and  Cabinet  member, 
while  the  latter  has  been  Governor,  Cabinet  member,  and 
in  the  diplomatic  service. 

There  are  various  reasons  why  Representatives  desire 
translation  to  the  Senate:  First,  the  longer  term;  second. 
Senators  being  fewer,  their  votes  are  more  important; 
third,  patronage;  fourth,  participation  in  treaty-making 
power;   fifth,  greater  social  recognition. 


220  MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

The  primary-election  method  of  nominating  candi- 
dates for  membership  in  the  House  helps  the  sitting  mem- 
ber to  retain  his  seat  if  he  is  at  all  worthy  of  it.  "The 
favorite  son'*  scheme  cannot  be  so  successfully  worked 
as  under  the  old  convention  system.  The  more  "favorite 
sons'*  who  shy  their  castors  into  the  ring  the  better  for 
the  incumbent,  unless  a  popular  man  from  his  own  strong- 
hold competes. 

Independent  of  this,  however,  there  is  a  growing  dis- 
position among  the  voters  to  give  a  man,  when  once 
elected  to  the  House,  a  longer  lease.  The  truth  is  being 
more  and  more  realized  by  the  public  that,  other  things 
being  equal  or  anywhere  near  equal,  the  value  of  the 
Representative  or  Senator  increases  in  proportion  to  his 
length  of  service.  A  man  must  learn  to  be  a  Represent- 
ative or  Senator,  just  as  he  must  learn  to  be  a  farmer, 
carpenter,  blacksmith,  merchant,  engineer,  lawyer,  doc- 
tor, preacher,  teacher,  or  anything  else.  Of  course  some 
men  learn  quicker  than  others — some  of  exceptional 
ability  and  powers  of  observation  very  speedily,  and  some 
not  at  all.  The  best  plan  for  a  constituency  to  pursue  is 
to  select  a  man  of  good  sense,  good  habits,  and  perfect 
integrity,  young  enough  to  learn,  and  re-elect  him  so  long 
as  he  retains  his  faculties  and  is  faithful  to  his  trust. 
Such  a  man  grows  into  power  and  high  position  as  surely 
as  the  sparks  fly  upward.  As  a  rule,  in  both  House  and 
Senate,  the  best  places  go  to  men  of  long  service,  provided 
they  are  capable,  sober,  industrious,  vigilant,  and  punct- 
ual in  the  discharge  of  their  duties.  No  man  should  be 
sent  to  either  House  of  Congress  solely  to  gratify  his  own 
ambition,  but  because  he  has  qualifications  for  the  posi- 
tion which  he  seeks — indeed,  better  qualifications  than 
any  of  his  opponents. 

New  England,  together  with  Pennsylvania,  has  under- 
stood all  these  things  from  the  beginning,  and  has 
profited  largely  by  it.    Finding  a  good  man,  they  send 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  221 

him  to  Congress  and  keep  him  in  harness  as  long  as  he 
hves,  or  until  he  voluntarily  retires  or  until  he  is  promoted 
or  until  he  is  landed  high  and  dry  by  a  poUtical  revolu- 
tion. Consequently  New  England  and  Pennsylvania  have 
an  influence  at  Washington  out  of  all  proportion  to  their 
population,  wealth,  or  intelligence.  For  instance,  in  the 
Fifty-fourth  and  Fifty-fifth  Congresses,  Maine,  with  only 
four  Representatives,  held  in  the  House  the  Speakership, 
together  with  the  much-coveted  chairmanships  of  the 
great  committees  on  Ways  and  Means,  Naval  Affairs, 
and  Public  Buildings  and  Grounds,  while  at  the  other  end 
of  the  Capitol  Senator  Frye  was  President  pro  tempore  of 
the  Senate  and  chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Finance, 
while  Senator  Hale  was  chairman  of  the  Committee  on 
Naval  Affairs  and  stood  second  on  the  Committee  on 
Appropriations.  Most  assuredly  Maine  held  the  coign 
of  vantage  in  those  Congresses.  To  borrow  one  of 
** Uncle  Joe's"  favorite  expressions,  Maine  was  "the 
whole  shooting-match." 

At  that  time  Speaker  Reed  was  one  of  the  two  most 
prominent  RepubHcans  in  America,  but  he  could  not  have 
displaced  either  Frye  or  Hale  in  the  Senate,  because  the 
Republicans  of  Maine  realized  that  they  had  served  them 
faithfully  and  well  and  would  not  turn  them  out.  Con- 
sequently Senator  Frye  stayed  in  the  Senate  till  he  died, 
and  Senator  Hale,  after  thirty  years'  service,  was  retired 
only  by  a  Democratic  landslide.  Otherwise  he  would 
have  remained  in  the  Senate  all  his  life. 

In  1876  James  Gillespie  Blaine  was  the  most  popular 
man  in  America  and  had  ten  times  more  fame  than  both 
the  Maine  Senators  combined,  but  he  had  no  chance  to 
go  to  the  Senate  until  Senator  Morrill  resigned  from  the 
Senate  to  serve  as  Collector  of  the  Port  of  Portland,  so  as 
to  save  some  money  for  his  old  age. 

The  Representative  longest  in  continuous  service  is 
9^lle4  thQ  "F^the?  of  th^  |lpvi§e/'    Wh^n  General  Har^- 


222   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

mer,  of  Philadelphia,  who  held  that  title,  died,  General 
Bingham,  also  of  Philadelphia,  succeeded  to  the  title.  In 
announcing  his  predecessor's  death  he  said  that,  includ- 
ing himself,  five  Philadelphians,  Kelley,  Randall,  O'Neal, 
Harmer,  and  Bingham,  had  in  immediate  succession 
borne  the  title  of  "  Father  of  the  House,"  and  that  their 
joint  services  amounted  to  one  hundred  and  forty-seven 
years!  Happily  for  the  country,  General  Bingham,  gal- 
lant soldier,  splendid  gentleman,  able  statesman,  served 
ten  years  longer,  running  the  total  service  of  these  five 
men  up  to  one  hundred  and  fifty-seven  years.  When  he 
died,  mirahile  dictu!  Hon.  John  Dalzell,  of  Pittsburg, 
became  the  "Father  of  the  House,"  and  would  still  be 
but  for  the  political  cataclysm  of  191 2.  He  is  one  of  the 
ablest  House  Republicans  in  twenty  years,  to  my  certain 
knowledge. 

Certainly  six  Pennsylvania  "Fathers  of  the  House,"  in 
an  unbroken  fine,  should  set  the  rest  of  the  country  to 
thinking. 

All  of  this  illustrious  sextet  died  in  office,  except 
Dalzell,  and  he  was  succeeded  as  "Father  of  the  House" 
by  Hon.  WilHam  A.  Jones,  of  Virginia,  a  lineal  descendant 
of  "Light  Horse  Harry"  Lee. 

When  "Father  Jones"  died  he  was  succeeded  in  that 
honorable  seniority  by  Frederick  H.  Gillett,  of  Massa- 
chusetts, and  the  man  from  Massachusetts  is  now  also 
the  Speaker  as  well  as  "Father  of  the  House,"  and  that  is 
indeed  a  very  rare  conjunction  of  honors. 

When  I  first  came  to  Congress  there  was  a  superstition 
to  the  effect  that  no  Representative  would  ever  serve 
thirty  years.  A  few  had  served  over  twenty-nine  years, 
but  all  of  them  had  died  before  they  finished  the  thirty- 
year  period.  Judge  William  S.  Holman,  of  Indiana, 
"The  Great  Objector,"  the  watch-dog  of  the  Treasury 
far  excellence,  broke  the  hoodoo  March  4,  1895,  when  he 
concluded  his  thirtieth  year  of  House  service.    He  was 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  223 

nominated  twenty  times,  being  elected  sixteen  and  de- 
feated four.  Since  Holman's  day  several  members  have 
exceeded  the  thirty  years'  Hmit.  Hon.  Joseph  Gurney 
Cannon,  of  lUinois,  my  immediate  predecessor  in  the 
Speakership,  holds  the  record  for  longest  House  service, 
with  forty-five  years.  He  was  nominated  twenty-five 
times.  He  won  twenty-three  times  and  lost  in  two 
Democratic  landsHdes.  If  he  lives  out  his  present  term 
he  will  have  been  in  the  House  forty-six  years.  In  1890 
he,  WiUiam  McKinley,  and  Benjamin  Butterworth,  the 
brilliant  orator  and  statesman  from  Cincinnati,  were  all 
defeated.  By  accident  they  all  met  in  Chicago  just  after 
the  election  and  were  dining  together.  McKinley,  not 
then  realizing  his  splendid  future,  and  Butterworth  ex- 
pressed the  idea  that  they  did  not  regret  the  result;  in 
fact,  were  rather  glad  than  otherwise,  as  they  could  now 
attend  to  their  private  affairs,  etc.  Uncle  Joe,  who  is  a 
plain,  blunt  man,  as  Mark  Antony  claimed  to  be,  lis- 
tened to  this  line  of  conversation  until  his  patience  was 
exhausted.  Then  he  blurted  out:  "Oh,  hell!  boys,  tell 
that  to  the  marines.  There's  no  use  for  us  to  lie  to  one 
another!  It  hurts,  and  it  hurts  damned  bad!"  It  looks 
as  though  Uncle  Joe  has  a  life-tenure,  as  all  parties  in  his 
district  have  agreed  to  give  him  a  unanimous  nomination 
in  1920. 

The  first  man  to  serve  thirty  consecutive  years  in  the 
Senate  was  Col.  Thomas  Hart  Benton,  of  Missouri. 
Had  he  been  willing  to  conciliate  anybody  he  would  have 
served  in  the  Senate  till  his  death,  April  10,  1858,  which 
would  have  given  him  one  month  and  six  days  more  than 
thirty-seven  years  in  that  "august  body."  Subsequently 
to  his  thirty  years  in  the  Senate — "six  full  Roman  lus- 
trums," as  he  boasted — he  served  two  years  in  the  House, 
where  he  was  regarded  and  referred  to  as  a  great  histori- 
cal personage.  He  had  the  queer  experience  in  the  House 
of  hearing  the  first  volume  of  his  great  work,  Thirty  Years^ 


224  MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

View — ^without  which  the  library  of  no  student  of  our  af- 
fairs is  complete — quoted  freely  as  an  authority  on  the  floor. 

When  Colonel  Benton  finished  his  one  term  in  the 
House  he  not  only  held  the  record  for  length  of  senatorial 
service,  but  also  for  length  of  combined  Congressional 
service  in  the  two  Houses — a  period  of  thirty-two  years. 
Nobody  equaled  his  senatorial  length  of  service  until 
March  4,  1897,  when  the  venerable  Justin  S.  Morrill,  of 
Vermont,  entered  upon  his  thirty-first  senatorial  year. 
Morrill  had  had  twelve  years  in  the  House  prior  to  going 
to  the  Senate.  He  served  twelve  years  in  the  House  and 
thirty-one  years,  nine  months,  and  twenty-four  days  in 
the  Senate,  which,  added  to  his  twelve  years  as  a  Repre- 
sentative, gives  him  a  total  of  forty-three  years,  nine 
months,  and  twenty-four  days  of  Congressional  service, 
and  the  record  exceeding  that  of  William  B.  Allison,  of 
Iowa,  by  four  months  and  twenty-four  days.  He  had 
eight  years  in  the  House  and  thirty-five  years  and  five 
months  in  the  Senate. 

Since  Benton's  day  several  men  have  equaled  Benton's 
senatorial  length  of  service:  John  Sherman,  of  Ohio; 
John  P.  Jones  and  William  M.  Stewart,  of  Nevada; 
Shelby  M.  Cullom,  of  lUinois;  Eugene  Hale,  of  Maine; 
Francis  M.  Cockrell,  of  Missouri;  Henry  M.  Teller,  of 
Colorado;  John  T.  Morgan,  of  Alabama;  and  William  P. 
Frye,  of  Maine.  Sherman  served  thirty-two  years  in  the 
Senate,  in  two  sections  of  sixteen  years  each,  resigning 
once  to  be  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  and  once  to  be 
Secretary  of  State.  His  public  service  in  Washington  was 
close  to  forty-six  years  in  House,  Senate,  and  Cabinet. 
The  senatorial  service  of  Stewart  of  Nevada  and  of 
Teller  of  Colorado  was  in  two  sections,  so  that  Missouri, 
which  was  the  first  state  to  furnish  the  country  a  Senator 
for  thirty  years  of  consecutive  service,  remains  to  this 
day  one  of  two  states  to  give  two  Senators  each  thirty 
years  of  consecutive  service — Benton  and  Cockrell — the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  225 

other  state  being  Maine.  Colonel  Benton  was  defeated 
for  a  sixth  term  by  reason  of  a  bitter  feud  in  the  Demo- 
cratic party,  while  General  Cockrell  lost  his  sixth  term 
because  of  the  Roosevelt  landslide,  which  gave  the  Re- 
publicans a  majority  of  ten  on  joint  ballot  in  the  Missouri 
Legislature. 

In  order  for  a  Representative  to  serve  a  long  time,  he 
must  begin  young,  the  politics  of  his  district  must  remain 
the  same,  and  he  must  continue  to  be  the  favorite  of  his 
constituents.  Likewise,  in  order  for  a  man  to  have  a 
long  senatorial  career  he  must  begin  young,  the  politics 
of  his  state  must  remain  the  same,  and  he  must  continue 
his  party  favorite  in  his  state. 

It  not  infrequently  happens  that  a  prominent  member 
of  the  House  is  defeated  for  re-election.  Indeed,  a  promi- 
nent member  seems  as  liable  to  defeat  as  an  inconspicu- 
ous one.  About  half  of  the  prominent  ones  who  are^ 
defeated  "come  back."  Examples  of  these  are  Joseph  G. 
Cannon,  of  Illinois;  "Silver*'  Dick  Bland,  of  Missouri; 
Gen.  Daniel  E.  Sickles;  Sereno  E.  Payne;  General  Ket- 
cham,  all  of  New  York;  Galusha  Grow,  of  Pennsylvania; 
and  William  S.  Holman,  of  Indiana.  Usually,  if  they 
ever  come  back,  it  is  at  the  next  election — but  there  was 
an  interval  of  thirty-two  years  between  General  Sickles's 
two  terms  and  of  over  th  ty-one  years  between  Grow's 
two  services.  Grow,  who  succeeded  David  Wilmot,  of 
Wilmot  Proviso  fame,  in  1 851,  was  elected  for  six  consec- 
utive terms,  being  Speaker  the  last  term,  and  was  de- 
feated for  re-election  to  the  House  in  1862.  He  is  the 
only  member  ever  defeated  for  re-election  to  the  House 
while  Speaker.  He  re-entered  the  House  in  the  summer 
of  1894,  served  several  years,  being  highly  regarded  as  a 
sort  of  antique  political  curio. 

William  E.  Gladstone  served  sixty-five  years  in  the 
House  of  Commons.  So  far  as  I  have  been  able  to 
ascertain,  his  is  the  longest  service  in  that  body,  although 

Vol.  I.— 15 


226   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

I  am  not  certain  about  it,  but  the  British  system,  particu- 
larly the  old  British  system  before  the  day  of  reform 
bills,  was  much  more  favorable  to  length  of  service  than 
is  our  system.  In  the  first  place,  they  were  permitted 
to  enter  Parliament  at  an  earlier  age  than  we  do.  Charles 
James  Fox,  for  instance,  began  his  great  parliamentary 
career  at  nineteen. 

The  facts  that  in  Great  Britain  a  man  may  represent 
any  constituency  and  that  the  various  constituencies  do 
not  hold  elections  on  the  same  day  are  favorable  to  the 
continuance  of  the  more  prominent  members  in  the 
House.  If  a  prominent  member  is  defeated  by  one  con- 
stituency he  can  appeal  to  another.  Indeed,  Mr.  Balfour, 
the  great  Tory  leader,  was  defeated  by  two  constituencies 
in  the  last  sweeping  Liberal  victory,  and  was  forced  to 
appeal  to  a  third  before  he  could  obtain  an  election,  and 
it  is  generally  believed  that  he  succeeded  even  then  only 
through  connivance  of  the  Liberal  leaders  and  by  reason 
of  their  generosity  or  wisdom.  The  one  fact,  however, 
which  contributed  most  to  length  of  service  in  the  old 
times  was  the  rotten-borough  system,  where  there  were 
few  voters,  and  they  controlled  absolutely  by  certain  great 
famiUes.  A  duke  or  earl  sometimes  practically  owned 
a  dozen  or  more  seats  in  the  House  of  Commons,  disposing 
of  them  to  whomsoever  they  pleased — generally,  of  course, 
to  their  sons  or  to  those  who  would  be  of  the  greatest 
political  benefit.  Some  of  the  most  briUiant  and  famous 
British  statesmen  began  their  careers  by  representing 
rotten  or  pocket  boroughs — ^among  them  the  elder  Pitt, 
Edmund  Burke,  and  Charles  James  Fox — and  a  few  of 
them  never  represented  any  other  sort  of  constituency. 
Practically  they  were  appointed  rather  than  elected  to 
the  House  of  Commons.  The  various  reform  bills,  how- 
ever, have  to  a  large  extent  abolished  the  rotten  boroughs, 
and  they  now  have  a  representative  system  somewhat 
approximating  ours. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  127 

Henry  Clay  was  first  appointed  to  the  Senate  of  the 
United  States  for  a  fragmentary  term  in  1806,  and  died 
in  the  Senate  in  1852,  there  being  forty-six  years  between 
his  entrance  and  his  exit.  It  is  almost  a  certainty  that 
he  could  have  retained  his  toga  and  his  curule  chair  dur- 
ing that  entire  period  had  he  so  desired,  but  he  was 
gunning  for  bigger  game  and  spent  the  major  portion  of 
his  manhood  days  chasing  the  Presidency,  only  to  see 
himself  passed  over  and  inferior  men  preferred;  for,  from 
the  close  of  Jefferson's  administration  in  1809  to  the  end 
of  Fillmore's  in  1853,  during  which  Clay  reached  the  end 
of  his  long  and  tempestuous  search  for  the  unattainable, 
as  a  popular  leader — indeed,  as  a  popular  idol — he  over- 
topped all  the  Presidents  save  Andrew  Jackson  alone — 
his  most  relentless  foe.  Between  the  beginning  and  end 
of  his  senatorial  career  Clay  held  several  offices  and  played 
many  parts,  always  with  an  eye  on  the  White  House. 
After  his  brief  senatorial  service  by  appointment,  he  was 
again  a  member  of  the  state  House  of  Representatives, 
and  its  Speaker;  served  another  fragment  of  a  senatorial 
term,  that  time  by  election.  He  was  then  elected  to  the 
national  House  of  Representatives,  and  chosen  Speaker, 
for  six  full  terms,  but  not  consecutive.  In  18 14  he  re- 
signed to  go  to  Ghent  as  Peace  Commissioner,  along  with 
John  Quincy  Adams,  Albert  Gallatin,  James  A.  Bayard, 
and  Jonathan  Russell. 

As  soon  as  he  returned  to  America  he  was,  as  a  matter 
of  course,  again  elected  to  the  House,  and,  equally  as  a 
matter  of  course,  again  chosen  Speaker.  Once  more  he 
resigned  to  mend  his  financial  fortunes.  After  a  year  or 
two  at  the  bar  he  once  more  returned  to  the  House  and 
to  the  Speakership.  After  serving  in  both  the  House 
and  the  Chair  ten  years  and  two  hundred  and  forty-five 
days  on  his  six  elections  to  both — for  his  services  in  the 
House  and  the  Chair  were  synchronous — he  quit  both 
forever  to  become  Secretary  of  State  under  the  younger 


228   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Adams — unfortunately  for  his  own  fame  and  fatally  for 
his  presidential  aspirations.  He  ran  for  the  Presidency 
in  1824,  1832,  1840,  1844,  and  1848 — the  longest  chase 
on  record.  He  was  gouged  out  of  the  Whig  nomination 
in  1840  and  1848,  chiefly  through  the  MachiavelHan 
machinations  of  Thurlow  Weed,  one  of  the  New  York 
Whig  triumvirate  of  Seward,  Weed,  and  Greeley,  which 
was  dissolved  in  1854  t>y  the  angry  "withdrawal  of  the 
junior  partner"  in  a  letter  which  is  the  queerest  com- 
pound in  all  literature  of  wit,  sarcasm,  caustic,  and  pathos. 
Greeley  was  madder  than  a  bald  hornet  because  he  had 
received  no  pap,  but  he  evened  up  the  score  with  his 
senior  partners  at  Chicago  in  i860,  when  he  shpped  his 
stiletto  under  Seward's  fifth  rib  and  commended  the 
poisoned  chalice  to  their  own  lips. 

After  his  defeat  for  the  Whig  presidential  nomination 
in  1848,  Clay  uttered  this  plaint,  which  will  forever  echo 
down  the  corridors  of  time:  "I  am  the  most  unfortunate 
of  men — always  nominated  when  no  Whig  can  be  elected 
— always  defeated  for  the  nomination  when  any  Whig 
could  be  elected." 


CHAPTER  IX 

Cleveland'ssecond  inauguration — Gresham — Carlisle— Lamont — Bisscll — Olncy 
— Vice-President  Stevenson. 

THE  weather  in  Washington,  March  4,  1893— the  day 
on  which  Grover  Cleveland  was  inaugurated  the  sec- 
ond time,  and  on  which  I  began  my  long  Congressional 
service — was  as  bad  as  mortal  man  ever  endured — windy, 
stormy,  snowy,  sleety,  icy.  It  was  prophetic  of  the  politi- 
cal weather  during  the  last  Cleveland  administration. 
Scores  of  people  lost  their  lives  by  braving  that  tempestu- 
ous weather. 

The  day  of  Cleveland's  first  inauguration  was  ideal — 
bright,  sunshiny,  balmy — and  for  eight  years  his  enthusi- 
astic followers  dubbed  every  fine  day  "Cleveland 
weather,"  just  as  Napoleon  and  his  worshipers  were 
forever  prating  of  "The  Sun  of  Austerlitz";  but  the  mar- 
row-freezing day  of  his  second  inauguration  ended  the 
rejoicing  about  "Cleveland  weather."  No  ear  has  heard 
of  it  any  more. 

The  outgoing  and  incoming  Presidents,  who  had 
taken  it  turn  about  in  defeating  each  other,  rode  up  to 
the  Capitol  together  and  entered  the  Senate  Chamber 
side  by  side — Cleveland  towering  a  full  head  above  Harri- 
son and  weighing  nearly  twice  as  much.  Sitting  down. 
Gen.  Benjamin  Harrison  looked  as  tall  as  Mr.  Cleveland. 
His  low  stature  grew  out  of  the  shortness  of  his  legs, 
whereas  Abraham  Lincoln's  towering  height  was  due 
chiefly  to  the  extraordinary  length  of  his  legs  from  the 
knees  down.    There  was  nothing  unusual  in  the  fact  that 


230   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

the  two  rode  and  walked  together.     That  is  the  rule  in 
such  cases  to  which  there  are  only  three  exceptions. 

John  Adams  was  in  such  a  hufF  because  of  his  defeat 
that  he  would  not  remain  in  Washington  to  see  Jefferson 
inducted  into  office.  John  Quincy  Adams  would  not  stay 
to  witness  General  Jackson's  inauguration  because  the  old 
hero  had  not  called  on  him — ^which  the  old  hero  failed  and 
neglected  to  do  because,  as  he  alleged,  Adams  had  helped 
circulate  slanders  about  his  wife.  Nobody  believes  that 
now,  but  the  Iron  Soldier  did  believe  it  with  all  his  heart, 
for  he  believed  anything  and  everything  discreditable  to 
his  enemies. 

Andrew  Johnson  and  General  Grant  hated  each  other 
so  cordially  that  neither  was  willing  to  ride  or  walk  with 
the  other.  Consequently  Johnson  was  not  present  at 
Grant's  inauguration. 

The  President-elect,  uncovered,  delivered  his  inaugural 
address  at  the  east  front  of  the  Capitol,  without  notes 
and  with  perfect  sang-froid,  in  a  clear,  ringing  voice,  to 
a  vast  concourse  of  his  fellow-citizens,  most  of  whom  were 
clapping  their  hands,  threshing  their  arms  about  their 
bodies,  stamping  their  feet,  and  moving  about  to  prevent 
being  converted  into  pillars  of  ice,  as  Lot's  wife  was  con- 
verted into  a  pillar  of  salt.  The  cadets  from  West  Point 
and  Annapolis  threw  down  their  guns  and  danced  a  war 
jig,  to  keep  their  blood  from  congeahng  in  their  veins. 
When  the  President  concluded,  a  mighty  shout  went  up, 
and  everything  was  merry  as  a  marriage-bell.  The  Presi- 
dent's beautiful  young  wife,  muffled  in  handsome  and 
abundant  furs,  was  the  cynosure  of  all  eyes,  and  even 
the  President's  heavy  and  solemn  countenance  lighted 
up  with  a  glad  smile  when  he  gazed  upon  her  happy 
face. 

It  appeared  queer  to  me  that  the  Congress  did  not,  at 
its  next  session,  change  the  inaugural  date  to  a  season 
when  experience  shows  that  pleasant  weather  may  be 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  231 

reasonably  expected,  but  I  did  not  know  then  half  as 
much  about  Congressional  vis  inertice  as  I  know  now. 

The  city  was  full  to  overflowing  with  jubilant  Demo- 
crats, who  counted  President  Cleveland  not  only  the 
Moses  of  Democracy  who  had  led  them  through  the  Red 
Sea  and  the  Wilderness  into  sight  of  the  Promised  Land, 
but  also  the  Joshua  who  had  brought  them  safely  into 
Canaan,  flowing  with  milk  and  honey.  They  were  anx- 
ious for  the  feast.  All  sorts  of  Democrats  were  there — 
men  and  women  from  the  plains,  the  mountains,  the  val- 
leys, the  seashore,  from  mine  and  forest  and  mill  and 
shop,  from  farm,  village,  and  city,  from  the  army  and 
navy,  from  the  prize-ring,  the  college,  the  pulpit — old 
mossback  Democrats  who  lived  on  husks  had  for  a  gen- 
eration jostled  and  touched  elbows  with  a  lot  of  dilettante 
eleventh-hour  converts  who  were  as  hungry  as  the  most 
ancient  old-timers.  The  regular  soldiers  were  there  by 
the  thousand,  men  of  wars,  men  with  their  jaunty  uni- 
forms were  there  by  the  hundreds — all  fraternizing  with 
the  handsome  lads  from  West  Point  and  Annapolis  and 
with  several  thousand  National  Guardsmen.  Every 
species  of  musical  instrument  known  among  men,  to- 
gether with  every  sort  of  toy  for  noise-making,  was  in 
use  that  day,  mingling  with  the  cannon's  roar,  the  shrill 
whistles  of  engines,  and  the  ear-splitting  shout  of  an  in- 
numerable throng  of  hilarious  Democrats  chanting: 

**Grover!  Grover!    Four  years  more  of  Grover! 
'And  now  we'll  live  in  clover!" 

Even  our  Republican  friends,  with  that  generosity 
characteristic  of  Americans,  acting  on  the  biblical  injunc- 
tion, "Rejoice  with  those  that  do  rejoice,"  helped  us  cele- 
brate our  wondrous  victory.  Perhaps  with  clairvoyant 
power  they  could  read  the  future! 

Most  assuredly  no  set  of  men  in  all  the  flood  of  time 


232   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

had  better  reason  to  jubilate  than  the  Democrats,  on  that 
great  and  noisy  day.  That  was  the  first  one  since  the 
4th  of  March,  1859 — a  period  of  thirty-four  long,  wear- 
ing, wearisome  years — that  we  had  had  the  President  and 
both  Houses  of  Congress.  No  body  of  men  in  the  annals 
of  politics  had  ever  made  such  a  long,  courageous,  dis- 
heartening, but  triumphant  fight  as  Democrats  had  made 
from  the  split  in  the  Democratic  Convention  at  Charles- 
ton in  i860  to  the  close  of  the  polls  in  1892,  when  they 
swept  the  country  from  sea  to  sea,  securing  an  over- 
whelming majority  of  both  the  popular  and  the  electoral 
vote,  carrying  all  the  doubtful  states,  together  with  such 
rock-ribbed  RepubHcan  strongholds  as  Wisconsin  and 
Illinois.  They  captured  half  the  electoral  votes  of  Michi- 
gan, and,  to  the  surprise  of  everybody,  Mr.  Cleveland 
secured  one  electoral  vote  in  Ohio,  which  magnificent 
state — mother  of  statesmen  and  Presidents — had  not 
voted  for  a  Democratic  President  since  1852,  when 
Franklin  Pierce  carried  all  the  states  in  the  Union  except 
four.  In  fact,  she  had  rarely  chosen  Democratic  electors 
even  prior  to  1852.     "'Twas  a  famous  victory!" 

After  hard  trials  and  great  tribulations,  after  a  long 
series  of  humiliating  defeats,  we  stood  proudly  on  the 
Mount  of  Victory,  sat  in  the  seats  of  the  Mighty,  held 
every  coign  of  vantage,  and  had  every  place  of  power  at 
our  disposal. 

No  pent-up  Utica  contracted  our  powers, 
But  the  whole  boundless  continent  was  ours. 

Most  assuredly  we  had  a  right  to  rejoice,  and  we  did 
rejoice  to  the  limit. 

No  people  ever  went  to  bed  happier  than  the  Demo- 
crats on  the  night  of  March  4,  1893. 

In  looking  back  upon  that  uproarious  and  eventful  day 
I  recall  the  pregnant  words  of  Alexander  Pope,  the  great- 
est epigrammatist  that  ever  lived : 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  233 

O  blindness  to  the  future  kindly  given 

That  each  may  fill  the  circle  marked  by  Heaven, 

Who  sees  with  equal  eye,  as  God  of  all, 

A  hero  perish  or  a  sparrow  fall. 

The  unalloyed  joy  of  Democrats  was  of  short  duration.  ^ 
March  the  5th  President  Cleveland  announced  his  Cabi- 
net, and  thereby  slapped  every  Democrat  betwixt  the 
two  seas  squarely  in  the  face  by  appointing  Gen.  Walter 
Q.  Gresham,  of  Chicago,  Secretary  of  State.  That  ap- 
pointment had  the  effect  of  an  ice-bath  upon  the  enthu- 
siasm of  old,  battle-scarred  Democrats  who  had  borne 
the  heat  and  burden  of  the  day — many  a  day — who  had 
cheerfully  and  gallantly  led  many  a  forlorn  hope,  who 
had  been  often  defeated,  but  never  conquered,  and  who 
believed  that  the  election  of  1892  was  a  Democratic 
triumph,  pure  and  simple.  It  was  a  blow  over  the  heart 
from  which  the  veterans  never  recovered.  They  could 
neither  understand  nor  justify  it,  and,  truth  to  tell,  the 
remnants  of  the  Old  Guard  cannot  understand  it  to  this 
day.  They  resented  it  bitterly;  they  still  resent  it;  not 
only  those  seeking  appointive  offices,  but  the  "boys  at 
the  forks  of  the  creek"  and  "in  the  trenches,"  who  want 
no  offices  and  expect  none,  but  who  fight  the  battles  of 
Democracy  for  the  love  of  fighting,  for  what  Caesar  de- 
nominates guadium  certaminis — the  joy  of  the  conflict. 
These  men,  all  over  the  country — and  there  was  a  vast 
army  of  them — denounced  President  Cleveland  as  a 
**  mugwump."  Their  idol  was  shattered,  their  mouths 
were  in  the  dust,  and  they  were  utterly  inconsolable. 

They  believed  that  Simon-pure  Democrats  were  en- 
titled to  the  rewards,  and  they  knew  that  whatever  else 
General  Gresham  was,  he  was  not  a  Democrat,  or  that  if 
he  was  on  March  5,  1893,  his  conversion  had  been  as  sud- 
den, if  not  as  miraculous,  as  that  of  Saul  of  Tarsus  as  he 
journeyed  from  Jerusalem  down  to  Damascus, 


234   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

General  Gresham  was  a  man  of  high  character,  of  com- 
manding presence,  of  fine  ability,  of  perfect  integrity,  of 
spotless  reputation,  and  with  an  unimpeachable  record  in 
both  civil  and  military  service.  He  bore  honorable  scars 
acquired  in  the  war  between  the  states.  He  rose  to  the 
rank  of  major-general  in  the  Union  Army.  He  had  held 
two  Cabinet  portfolios  under  President  Arthur,  and  had 
discharged  his  duties  faithfully  and  well.  For  many  years 
he  was  Federal  district  judge  in  Indiana,  and  when 
President  Cleveland  made  him  Secretary  of  State  he  was 
a  Circuit  Federal  judge  and  lived  in  Chicago.  All  these 
honors  had  been  conferred  upon  him  as  a  Republican. 
In  the  famous  Chicago  RepubHcan  Convention  of  1888 
he  had  been  a  strong  contender  for  the  presidential  nomi- 
nation, but  his  hated  Indiana  rival.  Gen.  Benjamin 
Harrison,  walked  away  with  the  glittering  and  greatly 
coveted  prize,  very  much  to  the  disgust  and  disappoint- 
ment of  General  Gresham.  There  was  an  ancient  and 
deadly  feud  between  this  twain — bitter  as  that  between 
the  Montagues  and  Capulets.  How  it  originated  this 
deponent  saith  not,  because  he  knoweth  not,  but  it  is  a 
matter  of  common  knowledge  that  it  existed— not  only 
existed,  but  was  of  the  proverbial  intensity  of  a  family 
feud — both  being  Union  generals,  both  Indiana  Repub- 
licans— rivals  both  at  the  bar  and  in  politics.  Whether 
General  Gresham  voted  for  General  Harrison  in  1888  and 
1892,  or  sulked  in  his  tent,  or  voted  for  President  Cleve- 
land, is  problematical,  but  the  patent  fact  remains  that 
as  late  as  1888  he  was  a  full-fledged  Republican  of  influence 
and  eminence.  This  fact  the  rank  and  file  of  Democrats 
knew  full  well,  and  they  did  not  believe  that  even  if  he 
came  over  to  the  Democrats  in  1888 — ^which  they  doubted 
— he  should  be  given  the  highest  place  in  a  Democratic 
Cabinet.  Perhaps  if  they  had  thought  that  there  would 
be  no  more  cases  on  all-fours  with  his,  they  might  have 
forgiven  the  President,  but  they  feared  that  his  appoint- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  235 

ment  was  only  a  precursor  of  many  more  of  the  same  sort 
and  they  were  sick  at  heart. 

It  so  happened  that  the  Secretaryship  of  State  turned 
out  to  be  apples  of  Sodom  to  General  Gresham.  The 
duties  of  the  place  were  not  to  his  taste,  and  he  found  no 
pleasure  in  them.  He  would  have  made  a  capital  attor- 
ney-general or  justice  of  the  Supreme  Court — because 
they  were  in  the  line  of  his  profession — of  his  life-work. 

So  on  the  night  of  March  the  5th  "a  change  came  o'er 
the  spirit"  of  the  dreams  of  thousands  of  Democrats,  and 
they  began  fihng  out  of  Washington,  headed  for  the  cave 
of  Adullam,  ready  for  revolt. 

Of  General  Gresham's  appointment,  Mr.  George  F. 
Parker,  one  of  Mr.  Cleveland's  most  partial  and  enthusi- 
astic biographers,  says:  **The  Secretaryship  of  State, 
conferred  upon  Judge  Walter  Q.  Gresham,  was  the  one 
surprise  of  the  Cabinet.  I  have  never  yet  heard  of  any 
man  to  whom  Mr.  Cleveland  had  spoken  about  this  office 
in  connection  with  the  appointee,  and  nobody  was  ever 
able  to  explain  how  or  why  he  was  chosen." 

The  President  appointed  as  his  Secretary  of  the  Treas- 
ury John  Griffin  Carlisle,  of  Kentucky,  then  the  most 
popular  Democrat  in  America,  but  who  Hved  to  be  rotten- 
egged  in  his  home  city  of  Covington,  so  bitterly  did  his 
old  constituents  resent  his  advocacy  of  the  Gold  Stand- 
ard. What  Mr.  CarUsle  thought  on  that  sad  and  unfor- 
tunate occasion  can  only  be  imagined.  Being  a  well-read 
man,  he  may  have  had  the  poor  consolation  of  recalling 
certain  historical  facts — that  Hannibal  was  banished  by 
the  Carthaginians  and  died  by  suicide  in  a  foreign  land; 
that  John  DeWitt  was  torn  limb  from  limb  in  front  of  his 
own  Senate  House  by  an  infuriated  mob;  that  Socrates 
was  compelled  to  drink  the  fatal  hemlock;  that  the  win- 
dows in  the  home  and  carriage  of  the  Duke  of  WelHngton 
were  broken  fifteen  years  after  Waterloo,  by  his  enraged 
countrymen;  that  the  doors  of  Faneuil  Hall  were  shut  in 


236   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

the  face  of  Daniel  Webster;  that  the  Legislature  of  Mas- 
sachusetts passed  resolutions  of  censure  upon  Charles 
Sumner  in  his  old  age,  and  other  like  instances;  but  all 
these  and  all  other  similar  cases  where  the  people,  "the 
plain  people,"  as  Abraham  Lincoln  loved  to  call  them, 
had  turned  against  popular  idols,  justly  or  unjustly,  could 
have  afforded  little  compensation  for  the  loss  of  the  love 
of  a  mighty  people  which  he  had  thrown  away  "like  the 
base  Indian  who  cast  a  pearl  away,  richer  than  all  his 
tribe,"  for,  after  Henry  Clay  and  John  C.  Breckenridge, 
Carlisle  was  more  fondly  loved  by  the  Kentuckians  than 
any  other  man. 

He  had  had  a  long  and  notable  career.  He  was  a  great 
lawyer.  He  had  served  in  both  Houses  of  the  Kentucky 
Legislature,  and  as  lieutenant-governor.  He  served 
many  years  in  the  National  House  of  Representatives; 
was  Speaker  thereof  for  three  full  terms,  and  by  common 
consent  is  rated  as  one  of  the  great  Speakers.  At  the 
time  of  his  appointment  to  the  Treasury  portfolio  he  was 
a  Senator  of  the  United  States,  with  every  prospect  of 
retaining  his  toga  and  curule  chair,  till  he  died  of  old  age 
or  voluntarily  retired.  To  him  more  than  to  any  other 
is  due  the  long  and  successful  fight  for  Tariff  Reform 
which  culminated  in  the  tremendous  Democratic  victory 
of  1892. 

The  masses  wanted  him  for  President  in  1892,  and  most 
probably  he  would  have  been  nominated  had  the  leaders 
believed  he  could  get  the  aid  of  as  many  independent 
voters  as  could  Grover  Cleveland.  The  desire  to  secure 
the  independent  vote  gave  the  nomination  to  the  ex- 
President  by  the  skin  of  his  teeth.  The  truth  is  that  any 
respectable  Democrat  could  have  been  elected  that  year. 

In  view  of  all  the  foregoing  facts^  the  bestowal  of  the 
Secretaryship  of  the  Treasury  upon  "the  Great  Ken- 
tuckian"  was  very  popular,  particularly  among  the  Silver 
Democrats,  who  looked  to  him  as  their  chief.    They  were 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  237 

especially  glad  to  have  him  conduct  the  financial  depart- 
ment of  the  government.  He  had  made  the  greatest 
Silver  speech  that  ever  fell  from  human  lips — a  speech 
unanswered  and  unanswerable,  which  Mr.  Carlisle  him- 
self came  nearer  answering  than  anybody  else  ever  did. 
He  enjoys  the  peculiar  distinction  of  having  made  both 
the  best  double-standard  speech  and  also  the  best  single 
Gold  Standard  speech  ever  delivered  since  the  world 
began.  When  he  became  a  single  Gold  Standard  advo- 
cate it  nearly  broke  the  hearts  of  his  friends,  who  had 
followed  his  fortunes  with  unshaken  fidelity  and  who 
had  dreamed  for  twenty  years  of  placing  him  in  the 
White  House.  In  hundreds  of  thousands  of  homes  his 
name  was  accursed.  Right  or  wrong,  his  Gold  Standard 
speech  ended  his  political  career.  He  supported  Palmer 
and  Buckner,  neither  of  whom  was  worthy  to  untie  his 
intellectual  shoe-latchets.  It  was  a  sad  close  to  a  public 
career  which  added  a  new  glory  to  the  Republic. 

To  me,  a  Kentuckian  born  and  bred,  his  change  of 
base  and  his  political  downfall  constituted  a  sore  political 
and  personal  bereavement.  My  feeling  for  him  was  not 
only  one  of  profound  admiration,  but  also  of  deep  per- 
sonal affection.  I  have  never  abused  him.  I  could  not 
find  it  in  my  heart  so  to  do.  But  I  have  grieved  ever 
since  he  committed  political  suicide.  If  he  had  continued 
as  he  began,  he  would  have  been  nominated,  and  elected 
President  in  1896,  for  it  was  CarHsle  far  more  than  Presi- 
dent Cleveland  who  created  the  Gold  Standard  sentiment 
in  the  West  and  South.  And  what  a  President  he  would 
have  made !  easily  the  peer  mentally  of  any  Chief  Executive 
of  the  Republic. 

Daniel  S.  Lamont,  of  New  York,  was  Secretary  of  War 
— a  most  capable  official  as  well  as  a  delightful  gentleman. 

There  have  been  about  fifty  Secretaries  of  War.  The 
first  one  with  whom  I  was  personally  acquainted,  Daniel 
S,  Laniont,  filled  the  place  pnce  held  by  men  illustrious 


238   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

in  their  lives,  but  most  of  whom  are  as  thoroughly  for- 
gotten in  their  graves  as  though  they  had  never  been 
born.  It  is  said  that  the  reason  why  Colonel  Lamont 
left  off  making  money  hand  over  fist,  to  accept  the  war 
portfolio,  was  the  fame  which  it  would  bring  his  children. 
If  his  reputation  proves  as  ephemeral  as  that  of  most  of 
his  predecessors,  it  was  hardly  worth  acquiring. 

One  feat  of  memory  of  which  Thomas  Babington 
Macaulay  boasted  was  that  he  could  give  the  names  ot 
all  the  Popes  in  both  regular  and  reverse  order.  The 
chances  are  a  thousand  to  one  that  no  citizen  of  the 
Republic  can  repeat  seriatim  the  names  of  the  Secretaries 
of  War.     Truly  fame  is  a  vapor. 

There  are,  however,  some  familiar,  a  few  great,  and  one 
or  two  well-beloved  names  in  that  list.  It  contains  one 
President  of  the  United  States — James  Monroe — and  the 
only  President  of  the  Confederate  states — Jefferson  Davis, 
and  it  is  a  curious  coincidence  that  while  these  two  illus- 
trious men  achieved  their  most  enduring  reputation  as 
civilians  they  cherished  most  their  reputations  as  soldiers. 
The  same  thing  is  true  of  Aaron  Burr  and  Thomas  H. 
Benton,  though  neither  attained  higher  rank  in  the  army 
than  lieutenant-colonel.  Burr  wanted  to  be  a  brigadier- 
general  pending  our  troubles  with  France  during  John 
Adams's  Presidency,  and  there  was  serious  talk  of  making 
Benton  the  Commander-in-chief  of  the  American  Army 
in  Mexico,  with  the  rank  of  lieutenant-general.  Had 
that  project  been  consummated,  "Old  BuUion"  would 
probably  have  reached  the  Presidency,  and  thereby  have 
taken  from  Missouri  her  great  reproach  of  barrenness  in 
that  regard. 

Two  other  Secretaries  of  War — Lewis  Cass  and  John 
Bell — ^were  nominated  for  the  Presidency,  but  failed  of 
the  glittering  prize. 

William  H.  Crawford^  John  C.  Calhoun,  William  L. 
Marcy,  John  McLean,  Simon  Cameron,  and  perhaps  other 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  239 

Secretaries  of  War,  aspired  to  the  Chief  Magistracy  of  the 
Republic.  Calhoun  came  nearer  it  than  the  others,  as 
he  was  twice  elected  to  the  Vice-Presidency.  Had  it  not 
been  for  Peggy  O'Neil's  tantrums,  and  the  row  which 
grew  out  of  them,  and  the  active  part  which  Mrs.  Calhoun 
took  in  the  crusade  against  the  Irish  beauty,  and  the 
cunning  political  use  which  sly  Mr.  Van  Buren  made  of 
the  tempest  in  a  teapot,  the  great  nuUifier  might  have 
succeeded  "Old  Hickory."  But  no  man  whose  wife  was 
anti-Peggy  found  favor  in  the  eyes  of  the  grim  old  Lion 
of  the  Hermitage. 

John  Marshall,  who  was  Secretary  of  War  for  six  days, 
was  afterward  Chief  Justice  of  the  United  States  for 
nearly  thirty-five  years. 

Lamont  was  entitled  to  one  benediction  from  the  Ser- 
mon on  the  Mount:  "Blessed  are  the  peacemakers."  In 
politics,  especially  when  he  was  the  President's  private 
secretary  during  Mr.  Cleveland's  first  term,  that  was  his 
chief  business;  and  certainly  since  that  famous  utterance 
no  man  needed  a  peacemaker  on  his  staff  more  than  Mr. 
Cleveland.  He  had  no  equal  in  provoking  men  to  wrath 
and  Lamont  no  rival  in  applying  poultices  and  adminis- 
tering soothing-syrup.  As  an  emollient  for  soreheads  and 
sore-headed  politicians  he  excelled  slippery  elm  or  any- 
thing else  in  the  materia  medica. 

Thurber,  presidential  secretary  in  the  second  Cleveland 
administration,  was  just  the  reverse,  and  after  the  Presi- 
dent had  rubbed  the  skin  off  a  visiting  statesman  Thurber 
came  in  the  nature  of  strong  fish  brine  to  make  his  wounds 
smart — not  that  he  wanted  to  be  persona  non  grata  to  any 
human  being,  but  because  he  was  so  rigged  up  that  his 
efforts  to  be  hail-fellow  with  disgruntled  statesmen  only 
aggravated  them  the  more.  A  man  whom  Mr.  Cleve- 
land made  mad  got  madder  when  Thurber  undertook  to 
patronize  him  and  to  convince  him  that  the  President 
could  do   no  wrong — both    of  which    he    invariably  at- 


240  MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

tempted.  In  truth,  Thurber  lived  as  much  in  an  en- 
chanted world  as  did  the  melancholy  Knight  de  la  Mancha, 
and  to  him  Mr.  Cleveland's  hat  was  a  veritable  enchanted 
helmet  of  Mambrino. 

Lamont  was  the  nonpareil  of  private  secretaries,  and 
was  decidedly  the  smoothest  member  of  the  Cabinet. 
He  accomplished  more  with  less  friction  than  any  of  the 
men  who  stuck  their  legs  beneath  the  presidential 
mahogany.  Physically  he  was  blond,  bald,  willowy, 
graceful.  For  Lamont  the  country  is  indebted  to  Daniel 
Manning,  a  past-master  in  both  poHtics  and  journalism. 
When  Mr.  Cleveland  was  unexpectedly  elected  Governor 
of  New  York  he  knew  very  few  public  men  in  the  state, 
and  asked  Manning  to  select  some  bright  young  man, 
with  good  manners,  common  sense,  and  a  large  acquaint- 
ance among  politicians,  as  his  private  secretary.  Man- 
ning picked  Lamont,  who  was  then  a  reporter  on  his 
paper.  The  Albany  Argus. 

Thus  began  Lamont's  political  rise,  which  was  as  rapid 
as  that  of  his  patron. 

Newspaper  work  is  a  first-rate  schooling  for  public  life. 
Horace  Greeley,  Henry  J.  Raymond,  Henry  Watterson, 
James  Brooks,  Daniel  Manning,  Thomas  Hart  Benton, 
Carl  Schurz,  B.  Gratz  Brown,  Joseph  Puhtzer,  William 
Randolph  Hearst,  "Sunset"  Cox,  James  G.  Blaine,  Amos 
J.  Cummings,  Senator  Hawley,  Governor  Dingley,  Cap- 
tain Boutelle,  and  divers  others  who  have  succeeded  in 
politics  once  set  type,  did  reportorial  work,  or  edited 
papers. 

Speaking  from  a  somewhat  varied  experience,  I  state 
for  the  benefit  of  all  boys  that  even  my  short  career  of 
eleven  months  as  a  country  editor  has  been  of  more  last- 
ing benefit  to  me  than  any  other  equal  portion  of  my  life. 

Newspaper  work  forces  rapidity  of  thought  and  facility 
in  writing.  A  newspaper  man  must  frequently  fire  oflF- 
hand  without  a  rest.     He  can't  afford  to  scratch  his  head 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  241 

and  chew  the  end  of  his  pencil  a  week,  waiting  for  an  idea 
or  for  inspiration.  He  must  strike  while  the  iron  is  hot. 
Consequently  newspaper  men  in  Congress  are  among  the 
readiest  talkers  and  most  skilful  wrestlers.  They  may 
not  be  as  profound  as  the  philosophers,  but  in  the  general 
melee  usually  come  out  on  top. 

Another  habit  of  incalculable  value  to  a  public  man  is 
induced  by  newspaper  work — that  is,  of  noting  people's 
peculiarities,  habits,  capabilities,  and  idiosyncrasies — or, 
in  other  words,  of  reading  human  nature.  Mr.  Cleveland 
seemed  to  have  a  penchant  for  editors  as  constitutional 
advisers,  having  had  one,  Daniel  Manning,  in  his  first 
Cabinet,  and  having  three,  Lamont,  Hoke  Smith,  and 
J.  Sterling  Morton,  in  his  second. 

Over  and  over  again  the  saying  that  all  that  glitters  is 
not  gold  finds  confirmation.  Mrs.  Lamont  was  one  of 
the  most  popular  of  the  Cabinet  ladies.  Her  soirees  and 
dinners  and  receptions  were  universally  pronounced  de- 
lightful. She  lived  in  a  beautiful  home,  had  lovely 
children,  a  distinguished  husband,  and  a  host  of  friends. 
Thousands  of  women  envied  her.  But  after  the  manner 
of  Lot's  wife,  she  sometimes  looked  back  with  longing 
eyes,  so  it  is  said,  toward  vanished  scenes. 

Somebody  once  asked  her  what  was  the  happiest  period 
of  her  life.  "When  Dan  was  a  newspaper  reporter  at 
one  hundred  dollars  per  month,"  replied  the  lady  whose 
liege  lord  then  stood  fourth  in  the  line  of  succession  to 
the  White  House. 

No  able-bodied  man  in  America  looked  less  like  a  son 
of  Mars  or  a  disciple  of  Bellona  than  Mr.  Secretary 
Lamont,  unless  it  was  Gen.  Joe  Wheeler,  who  was  a 
lieutenant-general  at  twenty-seven,  and  who  did  a  vast 
deal  of  hard  fighting. 

Lamont  looked  better  fitted  to  lead  a  quadrille  than  an 
army,  but  in  piping  times  of  peace  executive  ability  more 
than  martial  talent  is  needed  in  the  War  Office.    Anyway, 

Vol.  I.— 16 


242   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

army  officers  are  so  jealous  of  one  another  that  they  prefer 
a  civilian  to  a  soldier  for  a  Secretary  of  War;  consequently 
a  majority  of  the  Secretaries  have  been  civilians. 

To  borrow  a  simile  from  railroaders,  Colonel  Lamont, 
as  private  secretary,  was  the  best  "buffer"  that  ever  stood 
between  a  President  and  the  surging  multitude  of  Con- 
gressmen and  their  place-hunting  constituents,  and  the 
same  suavity,  tact,  graciousness,  and  bonhomie  which 
made  him  a  universal  favorite  then  stood  him  in  good 
stead  in  his  higher  station. 

Above  all,  he  was  a  man  of  wondrous  common  sense, 
and  an  excellent  judge  of  men,  with  an  astonishing  facility 
for  keeping  his  mouth  shut  except  when  it  was  necessary 
for  him  to  talk.  If  it  be  true  that  "speech  is  silver  but 
silence  is  golden,"  then  Lamont  was  a  bonanza  gold-mine. 
Since  his  day  the  President's  "private  secretary"  has 
been  promoted  to  "the  secretary  to  the  President,"  with 
an  increased  salary,  but  the  duties  are  the  same.  The 
secretary  to  the  President  is  a  far  more  important  func- 
tionary than  most  people  wot  of,  and  exercises  a  potent 
influence  on  the  course  of  public  affairs,  having  the  presi- 
dential ear  whenever  he  desires  it.  He  hears  many 
things  about  persons  that  the  President  does  not  hear. 
He  sees  many  folks  that  the  President  cannot  see  for  lack 
of  time.  When  somebody  asked  Gen.  Joseph  E.  Johnston 
why  he  did  not  capture  Washington  the  night  after  the 
first  battle  of  Bull  Run,  he  replied:  "Because  I  did  not 
have  soldiers  twenty  feet  tall  so  they  could  wade  the 
Potomac!"  Probably  the  reason  why  the  President  can- 
not receive  all  callers  is  that  the  year  has  only  three 
hundred  and  sixty-five  days,  and  the  day  only  twenty- 
four  hours.  The  chances  are  that  a  President  is  the 
busiest  man  in  America,  and  the  secretary  to  the  President 
the  next  busiest.  In  patience  he  must  ex  necessitate  rival 
the  Man  of  Uz. 

Hilary  A.   Herbert,  of  Alabama,   an  ex-Confederate 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  243 

soldier,  long  a  prominent  member  of  the  House,  rising  to 
the  chairmanship  of  the  Committee  on  Naval  Affairs,  was 
Secretary  of  the  Navy.  His  service  in  Congress  caused 
him  to  take  things  by  the  smooth  handle,  and  made  him 
a  prime  favorite. 

The  Postmaster-General  was  Wilson  S.  Bissell,  of  Buf- 
falo, New  York,  the  President's  old  law  partner.  He 
was  much  of  the  Cleveland  type  both  mentally  and  physi- 
cally— in  the  latter  regard  being  about  one  and  a  half 
times  as  large  as  the  President.  General  Bissell  had  had 
no  experience  in  pubHc  service,  no  taste  for  it,  did  not 
want  to  be  in  the  Cabinet,  and  gladly  quit  it  in  the  middle 
of  his  term. 

There  has  for  years  been  an  apocryphal  story  floating 
around  in  the  Mississippi  Valley  to  the  effect  that  once 
upon  a  time  a  man  found  Col.  E.  D.  Baker,  then  a  youth 
in  Illinois,  afterward  a  Senator  from  Oregon,  who  was  colonel 
of  the  ''California  Regiment,"  and  died  a  soldier's  death 
at  Ball's  Bluff,  sitting  on  a  log  in  the  woods,  crying  as 
though  his  heart  would  break.  Interrogated  as  to  why 
those  tears,  he  blubbered  out  that  he  was  weeping  because 
he  could  never  be  President  of  the  United  States,  by  reason 
of  having  been  born  an  Englishman. 

Nobody  need  shed  many  briny  tears  at  the  idea  of 
never  being  a  Cabinet  Minister,  for  it  is  certainly  not  a 
bed  of  roses.  Under  almost  any  circumstances  it  is  what 
Mr.  Mantalini  would  have  called  "a  demnition  horrid 
grind."  Under  such  a  domineering,  dictatorial  President 
as  Mr.  Cleveland,  a  Cabinet  position  was  nothing  more 
than  a  head-clerkship.  Why  any  man  of  reputation 
would  resign  a  seat  in  the  Senate  or  House  for  that  gilded 
slavery  is  one  of  the  unfathomable  mysteries. 

Christopher  Columbus,  Ulysses  S.  Grant,  and  Grover 
Cleveland  were  all  aUke  in  one  respect — they  all  went 
on  voyages  of  discovery — the  immortal  Genoese  sailor 
to  discover  a  new  world,   and  the  two  Presidents  in 


244   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

search  of  unknown  men  to  place  in  charge  of  Cabinet 
portfolios. 

Grant  was  a  soldier  and  distrusted  all  civilians  until  he 
learned,  by  bitter  experience,  that  he  could  not  get  along 
well  without  trusting  such  men  as  Roscoe  Conkling,  who 
had  never  set  a  squadron  in  the  field. 

Cleveland  appeared  to  delight  in  digging  up  and  induct- 
ing into  high  places  statesmen  who  had  studiously  and 
successfully  hidden  their  talents  in  a  napkin  until  he 
turned  his  flashlight  upon  them. 

Four  of  his  second  Cabinet  were  utterly  unknown  out- 
side their  own  particular  bailiwicks.  The  great  body  of 
the  people  had  never  heard  of  them. 

When  their  names  were  announced  on  March  6,  1893, 
men  pinched  themselves  to  see  if  they  were  awake,  gazed 
at  each  other  as  stupidly  as  Dickens's  Fat  Boy,  suddenly 
roused  from  sleep,  and  wonderingly  asked  one  another, 
"Who  is  Bissell?  Who  is  Olney?"  Nine-tenths  of  them 
pronounced  Olney's  name  wrong — for  be  it  known  that 
the  **o"  in  his  name  is  long,  as  in  "note,"  and  not  short, 
as  in  "hop."  Yet  Olney  and  Bissell  were  the  only  ones 
in  the  Hst  destined  to  quit  Mr.  Cleveland's  Cabinet-table 
with  enhanced  reputation  and  enlarged  popularity. 

Bissell  was  a  tall  man — over  six  feet — a  huge  man — and 
by  no  means  bad-looking.  Neither  was  he  fat-witted. 
That  law  firm  of  Cleveland  &  Bissell  must  have  had  great 
weight  in  court. 

In  manner  General  Bissell  was  blunt,  brusk,  austere, 
irascible,  until  you  penetrated  the  case  of  reserve  in  which 
he  had  ensconced  himself,  when  he  was  pleasant,  playful, 
and  gracious.  There  was  nothing  bizarre,  dilettante,  or 
whimsical  about  him.  He  discharged  his  onerous  duties 
conscientiously,  according  to  his  lights.  These  were 
sometimes  flickering,  dim,  and  uncertain,  growing  largely 
out  of  the  fact  that  he  had  had  no  official  or  political 
experience,  and  had  confined  his  energies  to  the  practice 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  245 

of  corporation  law,  which  brought  him  very  little  into 
contact  with  the  masses.     Nevertheless,  he  did  his  best. 

His  office  of  Postmaster-General,  more  than  any  other 
Cabinet  position,  brings  the  incumbent  into  personal  re- 
lations with  Senators,  Representatives,  and  office-seekers. 
During  the  first  few  months  of  his  term  he  was  the  most 
unpopular  man  in  Washington.  Gradually  he  wore  off 
his  angularities,  increased  his  acquaintance,  softened  the 
asperities  of  his  style,  and  grew  in  popularity,  so  that 
when  he  quitted  the  office  at  the  end  of  two  years  every- 
body felt  very  kindly  toward  him.  Under  no  circum- 
stances whatever  would  he  ever  have  inspired  enthusias- 
tic devotion  to  his  person,  but  I  believe  that  if  he  had 
filled  out  the  four  years  he  would  have  been  the  most 
popular  man  in  the  Cabinet,  always  excepting  Col.  Daniel 
S.  Lamont,  who  was  a  universal  favorite. 

The  truth  is  that,  like  old  Doctor  Johnson,  General 
Bissell  had  nothing  of  the  bear  about  him  except  the 
coat.  ^ 

In  the  beginning  General  BiSell  was  much  disposed 
to  run  things  with  a  high  hand.  Whether  he  learned 
that  from  Cleveland  or  Cleveland  learned  it  from  him,  or 
whether  they  were  both  born  that  way,  or  whether  that 
was  the  bond  of  union  between  them,  I  don't  know. 

The  -saying,  "When  Greek  meets  Greek,  then  comes 
the  tug  of  war,"  had  a  fine  illustration  when  General 
Bissell  and  Bailey  of  Texas  ran  afoul  of  each  other,  if  a 
piece  of  gossip  which  floated  around  Washington  was 
true. 

Nothing  that  ever  wore  the  human  form  could  bully 
Bailey.  He  would  hold  himself  erect  and  express  his 
honest  convictions  in  any  presence,  however  august. 

The  story  ran  in  this  wise:  During  the  month  between 
the  calamitous  extra  session  and  the  more  calamitous  long 
session  of  the  Fifty-third  Congress,  Bailey  made  some 
speeches  down  in  Texas,  iii  which  he  spoke  his  mind 


246   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

freely  about  the  administration,  and  his  remarks,  as  re- 
ported in  the  papers,  were  by  no  means  complimentary. 
Of  course,  certain  persons  not  exactly  en  rapport  with 
Bailey  lodged  marked  copies  of  his  speeches  in  hands 
where  they  would  do  the  most  harm  to  Bailey.  So  when 
he  returned  to  Washington  and  went  to  see  General 
Bissell  about  appointing  a  postmaster,  Bissell  said:  "I 
don't  know  that  I  ought  to  pay  any  attention  to  your 
recommendations.  I  understand  you  have  been  making 
some  speeches  down  in  Texas  lately.  What  sort  of 
speeches  did  you  make?" 

Bailey  was  young,  but  he  had  the  courage  of  Richard 
Plantagenet  himself,  and  he  replied:  "It  is  none  of  your 
blanked  business  what  sort  of  speeches  I  made.  I  wasn't 
sent  to  Congress  to  represent  you  or  Cleveland.  I 
answer  to  nobody  but  my  own  constituents  and  my  own 
conscience  for  my  speeches.  You  can  appoint  this  man 
or  I  will  withdraw  all  my  recommendations  and  will 
never  set  foot  in  this  office  again  while  you  are  here." 

Bailey  didn't  get  his  man  in,  and,  true  to  his  wrathful 
promise,  he  never  set  foot  again  in  the  Post-Office  Depart- 
ment until  General  Bissell  vanished  from  the  scene. 

Once  I  heard  General  Bissell  in  a  rather  heated  con- 
troversy with  a  New  England  Congressman.  The  latter 
had  filed  charges  against  the  postmaster  for  "offensive 
partizanship,"  or  something  of  the  sort,  and  was  insisting 
that  Bissell  bounce  him  without  ceremony  or  dilly-dally- 
ing. "But,"  said  Bissell,  "he  has  written  to  me  demand- 
ing that  he  be  heard  in  reply."  "He  does  not  deserve  to 
be  heard,"  answered  the  Representative.  "He  shall  be 
heard,"  roared  the  Postmaster-General.  "In  New  York 
we  try  a  man  before  we  hang  him.  I  do  not  hope  to 
please  everybody  while  in  this  office,  but  there  is  one  man 
whose  mind  and  conscience  I  will  be  sure  to  satisfy,  and 
that  man  is  Wilson  S.  Bissell." 

It  is  my  firm  belief  that  the  law  ought  to  require  the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  247 

Incoming  President  to  appoint  his  Cabinet  at  least  three 
months  before  his  term  begins,  and  ought  to  compel  him 
then  to  put  in  that  period  traveHng  over  the  United 
States  to  learn  what  a  large  country  this  is,  and  some- 
what of  the  manners  and  customs  of  the  various  sections. 

Now  the  average  citizen  will  hardly  beHeve  that  run- 
ning a  livery-stable  is  to  a  man's  discredit  or  in  any  way 
disqualifies  him  from  being  a  postmaster.  Yet  that  fact 
came  near  preventing  my  naming  a  postmaster  in  my  own 
town. 

I  recommended  one — as  under  the  pernicious  and 
pestiferous  custom  which  had  grown  up  I  was  expected 
to  do.  Divers  and  sundry  charges  were  filed  against 
him,  supported  by  affidavits.  I  did  my  best  to  explain 
them  away,  and  succeeded  very  well  in  convincing  the 
general  that  the  things  complained  of  were  mere  indis- 
cretions of  youth,  and  not  such  as  to  show  any  moral 
turpitude. 

I  have  always  believed  that  membership  in  any  church 
argues  favorably  for  a  man's  character,  so  as  a  clincher 
I  said  to  the  general:  *'He  can't  be  a  very  bad  man,  as 
he  is  a  member  in  good  standing  in  the  Cumberland 
Presbyterian  Church." 

"What  sort  of  church  is  that?"  he  replied.  "I  never 
heard  of  it.  How  is  it  differentiated  from  the  old 
school?"  I  never  was  much  of  a  theologian,  but  I 
entered  on  a  disquisition  as  to  the  differences  which  led 
up  to  the  organization  of  the  Cumberland  Church — aided 
somewhat  by  friendly  suggestions  from  Benton  McMillan, 
Judge  Ellis,  and  other  Kentuckians  and  Tennesseeans 
who  happened  to  be  present. 

I  had  never  expected  to  be  placed  in  a  position  to 
expound  the  doctrines  of  the  Cumberland  Presbyterian 
Church,  and  I  am  not  cocksure  that  my  good  friends, 
President  Black,  Rev.  Taylor  Bernard,  Rev.  Alonzo 
Pearson  (one  of  my  old  pupils),  and  others  will  accept 


248   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

my  exposition  as  up  to  the  standard,  but  of  one  thing 
they  can  rest  assured — their  church  lost  nothing  in  dig- 
nity, influence,  or  numbers  from  my  version  of  its  origin 
and  history. 

When  I  had  concluded  my  theological  address  I  felt 
reasonably  sure  of  success,  but  several  times  I  have  been 
sorely  disappointed  in  verdicts  of  juries  and  decisions  of 
courts,  and  what  happened  just  then  did  not  give  me  a 
favorable  opinion  of  my  persuasive  powers  as  an  orator 
or  of  General  Bissell  as  a  subject. 

He  looked  at  me,  solemn  as  an  owl,  and  said,  "I  don't 
want  to  appoint  that  man."  "Why?"  I  asked.  "Be- 
cause he  runs  a  livery-stable,"  came  the  astonishing 
answer. 

Now  be  It  remembered  that  General  Bissell  had  a  tem- 
per of  his  own.  I  have  very  little  reputation  for  being 
wanting  in  that  respect  myself.  So  I  concluded  if  we 
undertook  then  and  there  to  argue  so  preposterous  a 
proposition  that  it  wouldn't  increase  our  friendship  to 
any  remarkable  extent  or  end  in  helping  my  man,  which 
was  the  main  thing. 

In  order  to  collect  my  scattered  thoughts  I  went  over 
to  the  House.  There  I  saw  John  DeWitt  Warner.  I 
said,  "Warner,  what  sort  of  a  man  is  Bissell,  anyhow?" 
"He's  honest,  and  firm  in  his  convictions,"  replied  the 
great  free-trader.  Then  I  told  him  my  case.  "Oh,"  he 
said,  "Bissell  is  all  right,  but  he  has  never  been  out  of 
Buffalo  much.  He  sometimes  forms  his  conclusions  from 
inadequate  premises — deduces  a  rule  from  too  few  in- 
stances. He  probably  knew  some  disreputable  man  in 
Buffalo  who  ran  a  livery-stable,  and  jumped  to  the  con- 
clusion that  all  livery-stable  keepers  are  a  tough  lot." 

So  I  thought  and  thought  all  day.  Bissell  had  told  me 
once  that  he  could  remember  what  I  wrote  better  than 
what  I  said,  consequently  1  wrote  him  an  affectionate 
epistle,  in  which  I  explained  that  I  did  not  know  anything 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  249 

about  New  York,  its  politics,  manners,  customs,  society, 
etc.,  but  did  understand  the  country  west  of  the  Missis- 
sippi, and  that  to  conduct  a  livery-stable  out  there  was 
as  respectable  as  to  practise  law  or  sell  dry-goods,  and 
that  frequently  the  livery-stable  man  was  the  most  influen- 
tial man  in  the  community,  and  much  more  of  the  same 
sort. 

The  letter  appeared  to  have  the  desired  effect,  for  in  a 
few  days  the  man  whom  I  recommended  got  the  office. 

The  very  next  morning  I  went  after  the  general  for 
another  postmaster.  "Not  to-day,  young  man,"  he  said, 
with  a  benignant  smile.  "You  are  too  greedy.  You 
must  take  your  turn  and  give  others  a  chance.  I  ap- 
pointed a  man  for  you  yesterday  and  I  don't  believe  yet 
that  he  ought  to  have  been  appointed,  but  I  did  not  want 
to  give  you  a  black  eye  in  your  own  town" — which  was 
certainly  kind  and  generous  in  him. 

At  the  end  of  two  years,  after  he  had  become  acquainted 
with  everybody,  and  everybody  had  come  to  like  him. 
General  Bissell  grew  weary  of  his  honors  and  the  trap- 
pings of  power,  and  resigned  his  place  to  return  to  his 
law  practice.  No  wonder,  for  no  slave  on  a  treadmill 
ever  worked  harder  or  more  constantly.  It's  astonishing 
that  it  did  not  worry  him  into  the  shape  of  a  living 
skeleton. 

J.  Sterling  Morton,  of  Nebraska,  a  pioneer  Democrat 
in  that  state  while  it  was  yet  a  territory,  was  Secretary  of 
Agriculture — the  third  to  hold  that  office.  Gov.  Norman 
J.  Coleman,  of  Missouri,  being  the  first,  and  "Uncle 
Jerry"  Rusk,  of  Wisconsin,  the  second.  At  that  time 
the  Secretary  of  Agriculture  was  called  "the  baby  of  the 
Cabinet,"  the  Department  of  Commerce  and  the  Depart- 
ment of  Labor  not  having  then  been  created. 

Hoke  Smith,  of  Georgia,  a  prominent  lawyer  and  editor, 
as  well  as  proprietor  of  The  Atlanta  Journal,  since  Gov- 
ernor of  his  state  and  now  United  States  Senator,  was 


2SO      MY   QUARTER    CENTURY   X)F 

Secretary  of  the  Interior.  By  reason  of  the  President's 
attitude  toward  th^  Democratic  presidential  ticket  in 
1896  Secretary  Smith  resigned  about  six  months  before 
his  term  was  up,  and  supported  the  Democratic  ticket. 
He  was  succeeded  by  Gov.  David  R.  Francis,  of  Missouri, 
now  the  American  ambassador  to  the  Court  of  Petrograd. 

There  was  a  good  deal  of  gossip  as  to  the  why  and 
wherefore  of  the  appointment  of  so  young  a  man  as 
Mr.  Smith  to  the  Cabinet.  Nobody  who  knew  him 
doubted  his  ability  but  Georgians,  who  loved  him  not, 
asserted  that  he  was  selected  to  punish  Evan  P.  Howell, 
the  veteran  editor  of  The  Atlanta  ConstitutioUy  a  rival 
paper  to  Smith's  Journal.  The  Constitution  had  vigor- 
ously supported  Governor  and  Senator  David  Bennett 
Hill  for  the  presidential  nomination,  while  The  Journal 
had  just  as  vigorously  supported  Mr.  Cleveland.  The 
President  was  very  human,  and  while  he  did  not  agree 
to  the  proposition  contained  in  Representative  Tim  Camp- 
bell's witty  and  far-resounding  query,  "Mr.  President, 
what  is  the  Constitution  betwixt  friends?"  he  did  possess 
the  rare  virtue  of  standing  by  his  friends,  and  Hoke 
Smith,  Secretary  of  the  Interior,  was  one  result  of  that 
trait  in  President  Cleveland's  character  and  one  of  the 
chief  beneficiaries  thereof. 

He  in  turn  was  loyal  to  his  Georgia  friends,  and  ap- 
pointed so  many  of  them  to  office  that  Republican 
humorists  made  merry  with  him,  saying  that  "We  once 
marched  through  Georgia  under  General  Sherman,  but 
now  Georgia — under  the  leadership  of  Mr.  Secretary 
Smith — is  marching  through  us." 

Richard  Olney,  an  eminent  Boston  lawyer,  was  Attor- 
ney-General. He  discharged  his  duties  well,  no  doubt, 
but  in  that  office  he  did  not  enhance  his  reputation. 
When,  however,  Mr.  Secretary  of  State  Gresham  died, 
and  Mr.  Attorney-General  Olney  was  promoted  to  his 
place,  he  at  once  entered  upon  such  a  vigorous  foreign 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  251 

policy  as  to  challenge  the  attention  and  admiration  not 
only  of  his  country,  but  of  the  world.  His  strong,  em- 
phatic, luminous,  almost  bellicose,  assertion  of  the  Mon- 
roe Doctrine,  in  the  celebrated  squabble  with  Great  Brit- 
ain touching  her  threatened  encroachment  upon  the 
territory  of  little  Venezuela,  warmed  the  cockles  of  the 
American  heart  and  gave  him  enduring  fame  as  one  of 
our  greatest  Secretaries  of  State.  Those  new-fangled 
statesmen  who  think  the  Monroe  Doctrine  is  obsolete 
would  do  well  to  consider  Mr.  Secretary  Olney's  pro- 
nouncements on  that  subject  and  be  wise. 

Rev.  Sidney  Smith — one-third  preacher  and  two-thirds 
wit — declared  that  when  God  created  the  world  He  made 
round  holes  and  three-cornered  holes,  and  round  people 
and  three-cornered  people  to  fit  into  them;  but  the  trouble 
was  that  many  round  people  got  into  three-cornered  holes 
and  many  three-cornered  people  got  into  round  holes, 
and  consequently  there  were  many  misfits.  General 
Gresham  and  Mr.  Olney,  as  Cabinet  Ministers,  are  fine 
illustrations  of  Sidney's  theory.  From  the  beginning 
Olney  should  have  been  Secretary  of  State  and  Gresham 
Attorney-General. 

Illustrations  of  Sidney's  theory  abound  on  every  hand. 
For  instance,  General  Grant  was  a  flat  failure  as  a  cord- 
wood  dealer,  a  real-estate  agent,  and  a  merchant,  but  was 
a  superb  soldier.  Senator  Chauncey  Mitchell  Depew 
stoutly  maintains  that  most  men  desire  to  be  what  they 
cannot  be,  and  he  declares  that  General  Grant's  consum- 
ing ambition  was  to  be  an  orator! 

It  is  nowhere  recorded  that  Samuel  F.  Miller — one  of 
the  greatest  justices  of  the  Supreme  Court — ^was  a  shining 
success  as  a  shoemaker  or  as  a  country  doctor,  which  he 
was  till  past  thirty,  but  nobody  will  deny  his  pre-eminence 
as  a  lawyer  and  a  jurist.  Blessed  is  the  man  who  dis- 
covers what  he  is  fit  for — and  does  it. 

Mr.  Cleveland  used  the  veto  more  freely  than  any  other 


252   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OP 

President.  Indeed,  he  vetoed  more  bills  than  all  other 
Presidents  put  together,  Andrew  Johnson  standing  second 
in  that  regard.  The  fact  that  he  used  many  hours  in 
writing  vetoes  of  hundreds  of  small,  individual  pension 
bills,  during  his  first  term,  contributed  much  to  his  defeat 
in  1888.  But  he  beHeved  that  he  was  right  in  so  doing, 
and  nothing  could  turn  him  from  his  course  of  action. 
The  RepubHcans  printed  them  in  book  form  and  circu- 
lated the  book  widely  as  a  campaign  document,  greatly 
to  his  injury. 

While  he  could  lay  no  claim  to  oratory,  he  was  an 
effective  speaker.  His  voice  was  not  loud,  but  it  was 
resonant  and  carried  far,  filling  the  largest  hall.  His 
enunciation  was  excellent  and  distinct.  His  gestures 
were  few  and  appropriate.  His  stage  presence  was  im- 
pressive. Qne  great  virtue  he  possessed  as  a  public 
speaker — he  thoroughly  believed  what  he  said,  and 
thereby  he  made  his  auditors  believe  what  he  said — 
which  is  a  matter  of  vast  advantage  on  the  stump,  plat- 
form, or  hustings,  or  in  the  pulpit. 

Evidently  he  had  a  fine  memory,  for  he  rarely  used 
notes,  and  yet  he  adhered  closely  to  the  text  of  his  written 
addresses.  He  indulged  in  no  rhetorical  flourishes, 
eschewed  wit  and  humor,  quoted  little  poetry,  and  made 
few  historical  allusions.  He  was  not  blessed  with  imag- 
ination, but  was  a  matter-of-fact  man. 

A  primrose  by  a  river's  brim 
A  yellow  primrose  was  to  him. 
And  it  was  nothing  more. 

When  first  elected,  Mr.  Cleveland  had  seen  very  little 
of  his  own  country.  He  had  never  been  in  Washington 
City  until  the  day  before  he  was  sworn  in  as  President. 
Senator  Stewart,  of  Nevada,  was  neither  a  wit  nor  a  humor- 
ist, but  he  made  a  very  funny  speech  in  the  Senate  one 
night  during  the  great  Silver  debate,  by  ringing  innumer- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  253 

able  changes  on  the  sentence,  "He  moved  West  and 
settled  at  Buffalo,"  which  Stewart  found  in  the  Presi- 
dent's autobiography,  published  in  The  Congressional 
Directory,  According  to  the  Nevada  Senator,  that  was 
the  most  preposterous  sentence  ever  put  into  print.  Of 
course  his  purpose  was  to  belittle  the  President,  whom  he 
most  cordially  disHked. 

He  seemed  to  be  much  enamoured  of  the  coterie  of  very 
able  Southern  statesmen  then  to  the  fore  in  the  Senate. 
He  appointed  three  of  them  to  his  first  Cabinet — ^Thomas 
F.  Bayard,  of  Delaware,  Secretary  of  State,  who  had 
been  one  of  his  competitors  for  the  nomination,  and  whom, 
in  his  second  term,  he  made  ambassador  to  the  Court  of 
St.  James's;  L.  Q.  C.  Lamar,  of  Mississippi,  Secretary  of 
the  Interior,  whom  he  promoted  to  the  Supreme  Bench; 
and  Augustus  H.  Garland,  of  Arkansas,  Attorney-General. 
He  thereby  weakened  very  much  the  Democratic  con- 
tingent in  the  Senate,  but  acquired  three  extraordinarily 
strong  advisers  in  his  Cabinet. 

Mr.  Cleveland  is  perhaps  the  only  President  to  have 
made  money  in  Washington  real  estate.  He  is  said  to 
have  cleaned  up  something  in  the  neighborhood  of  one 
hundred  thousand  dollars  on  his  summer  suburban  home, 
popularly  known  as  "Redtop,"  in  a  perfectly  legitimate 
manner. 

He  was  one  of  two  bachelors  to  be  elected  to  the  Presi- 
dency— ^James  Buchanan  being  the  other;  but  President 
Cleveland  soon  joined  the  ranks  of  the  benedicts  by  marry- 
ing Miss  Frances  Folsom,  who  by  common  consent  was 
one  of  the  most  graceful  and  most  gracious  mistresses  of 
the  White  House. 

He  was  one  of  three  Presidents  who  married  while  in 
that  high  ofl&ce,  the  others  being  John  Tyler  and  Wood- 
row  Wilson.  The  Cleveland  wedding  was  in  the  White 
House,  while  Tyler's  was  in  New  York,  and  Wilson's  at 
the  home  of  his  bride,  in  Washington. 


254   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

While  in  Washington,  President  Cleveland  and  his  wife 
usually  worshiped  in  the  Dutch  Reformed  Church. 

When  Mr.  Cleveland  was  sworn  in  the  second  time  he 
lacked  fourteen  days  of  being  fifty-six  years  old,  and  was 
in  the  prime  of  robust  manhood.  He  stood  about  five 
feet  ten,  of  massive  build,  and  weighed  close  to  three 
hundred  avoirdupois.  His  eyes  were  gray,  his  hair  drab 
and  thin,  his  complexion  drab,  his  nose  large  and  high- 
bridged,  his  visage  solemn.  While  generally  in  good 
health,  at  times  he  suffered  intensely  from  gout.  He  had 
a  large,  shapely  head,  set  on  a  short  neck  of  unusual 
circumference,  which  rested  upon  shoulders  of  Herculean 
proportions.  So  conspicuous  in  his  tout  ensemble  was  his 
neck  that  the  wits  of  the  opposition  tried  to  make  capital 
by  such  side-splitting  squibs  as  "he  wears  a  number  seven 
hat  and  a  number  nineteen  collar,"  and  "he  can  pull  his 
shirt  off  without  unbuttoning  his  collar" — sorry  wit,  surely, 
but  everything  goes  in  a  campaign.  His  girth  was  alder- 
manic,  his  feet  large,  and,  to  use  a  popular  non-classical 
expression,  "he  was  firm  on  his  pins."  He  wore  a  small, 
grizzled  mustache,  neatly  trimmed.  While  not  by  any 
manner  of  means  a  Beau  Brummell,  he  dressed  well  and 
in  good  taste.  He  seemed  to  have  taken  to  heart  the 
advice  of  Polonius  to  Laertes: 

Costly  thy  habit  as  thy  purse  can  buy, 
But  not  expressed  in  fancy;  rich,  not  gaudy; 
For  the  apparel  oft  proclaims  the  man. 

Among  other  things,  he  generally  wore  a  dark  silk 
polka-dot  necktie  with  a  dash  of  red  in  it.  He  displayed 
little  jewelry.  In  manner  he  was  what  Mark  Antony 
vaunted  himself  to  be,  "a  plain,  blunt  man,"  which  Mark 
most  assuredly  was  not.  While  nothing  of  an  Apollo 
Belvedere,  he  was  of  distinguished  appearance.  He  was 
slow-motioned,  walked  with  ponderous  tread,  and  spoke 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  255 

clearly  and  deliberately.  He  not  only  moved  slowly;  he 
also  thought  slowly.  He  never  went  off  half  cocked.  He 
wrote  a  beautiful  hand,  in  small  characters,  and  was 
exceedingly  fond  of  using  polysyllabic  words  of  Latin 
derivation.  The  one  word  which  best  expresses  his  ap- 
pearance is  ''sturdy'* — ^which  descriptio  personce  he  illus- 
trated on  every  proper  occasion. 

His  office  was  near  the  head  of  the  stairs  in  the  White 
House  proper,  in  a  bright,  sunny  room  whose  windows 
afforded  a  splendid  view  of  the  Potomac,  the  Washington 
Monument,  and  the  Virginia  hills.  At  ten  o'clock  every 
morning,  except  Sundays  and  Cabinet  days.  Senators, 
Representatives,  office-seekers,  and  visitors  were  received 
by  the  President.  He  stood  near  the  northwest  corner  of 
a  big,  flat-topped  desk,  and  the  company — at  the  begin- 
ning of  his  second  administration  a  very  large  one,  but 
toward  the  close  a  small  one — passed  in  line  before  him. 
He  shook  hands  with  all  in  a  very  uncordial  fashion, 
speaking  a  few  well-chosen  words  to  each.  Evidently  he 
regarded  the  entire  function  as  a  great  bore  and  endeav- 
ored to  make  it  a  rapid-fire  performance.  Consequently, 
if  any  one  talked  to  him  longer  than  he  desired,  he  began 
to  back  toward  his  desk,  and  if  the  conversationalist  fol- 
lowed him  up,  he  turned  his  back  and  greeted  the  next 
visitor. 

He  had  a  sort  of  patent  way  of  shaking  hands  which  he 
probably  invented  for  self-protection.  He  grabbed  the 
visitor's  hand,  gave  it  a  slight  squeeze,  and  dropped  it 
Hke  a  hot  potato.  He  never  under  any  circumstances 
whatsoever  permitted  a  visitor  to  grip  his  large,  fat 
hand. 

He  possessed  a  sense  of  humor  notwithstanding  his  face 
was  usually  solemn  as  that  of  a  graven  image.  Some- 
times I  have  seen  him  smile  at  some  stray  remark  which 
touched  his  risibles,  and  once,  but  only  once,  I  heard 
him  laugh  out  loud  at  some  witty  sally  of  the  genial 


2s6   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

and  irrepressible  Timothy  Campbell,  popularly  called 
"Tim." 

Before  the  bitter  fight  on  Silver,  for  a  new  member  I 
got  along  with  him  very  well.  One  morning  shortly  after 
his  inauguration  I  called  on  him  for  the  first  time,  and 
was  urging  him  to  appoint  one  of  my  constituents.  Col. 
Richard  Dalton,  Surveyor  of  the  Port  of  St.  Louis.  The 
President  said,  among  other  things:  "But  Mr.  Dalton 
lives  one  hundred  and  twenty  miles  from  St.  Louis."  "I 
know  that,  Mr.  President,"  I  replied,  "but  he  does  not 
live  as  far  from  St.  Louis  as  Daniel  Magone  lived  from 
New  York  when  you  appointed  him  to  a  good,  fat  office 
in  that  city."  That  may  have  been  somewhat  imperti- 
nent in  a  new  member,  but  it  seemed  to  amuse  him.  At 
any  rate,  he  remembered  it,  for  when  I  next  visited  him 
and  started  to  tell  him  who  I  was,  he  grinned  and  said: 
"Oh,  I  remember  you!  You  are  the  man  who  jogged 
my  memory  about  Dan  Magone  living  farther  from  New 
York  than  your  friend  lives  from  St.  Louis." 

Dalton  finally  received  the  appointment.  It  is  not 
probable  that  the  reference  to  Magone  accomplished  it, 
but  I  have  always  believed  that  it  helped  a  little. 

Mr.  Cleveland's  only  recreation  appears  to  have  been 
hunting  and  fishing.  After  finally  quitting  the  White 
House  he  wrote  a  series  of  very  interesting  articles  on 
that  subject  for  a  widely  circulated  journal,  which  articles 
were  subsequently  published  in  book  form.  It  is  dear 
to  the  disciples  of  Daniel  Boone  and  Izaak  Walton. 

He  always  rode  in  a  carriage.  At  least  I  never  saw 
him  on  a  horse.  He  was  so  heavy  that  he  would  have 
needed  a  Norman  Percheron  or  a  Clydesdale  for  a  mount. 
When  that  delightful  gentleman,  former  President  Will- 
iam Howard  Taft,  who  was  heavier  even  than  Mr.  Cleve- 
land, was  Governor-General  of  the  Philippines,  the  ad- 
ministration was  uneasy  about  his  health.  One  day 
Governor  Taft  cabled  Mr.  Secretary  of  War  Efihu  Root 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  257 

that  he  had  been  out  horseback-riding  and  was  feehng 
fine.  Mr.  Root  cabled  back  the  witty  query,  **How  is 
the  horse  feehng?*' 

There  is  no  tale  in  the  Arabian  Nights  more  incredible 
than  Cleveland's  rise  to  the  Presidency.  Luck  helped 
him  amazingly.  He  was  born  in  the  village  of  Caldwell, 
in  northern  New  Jersey,  where  his  father  was  pastor  of 
a  small  Presbyterian  church.  He  and  his  flock  did  not 
get  on  well  together,  and  severed  their  relations  in  such 
a  way  that  President  Cleveland  resented  it  all  his  days. 
A  society  has  purchased  the  house  in  which  he  first  saw 
the  light  and  has  made  of  it  a  show-place.  It  has 
erected  a  monument  to  his  memory,  but  nothing  ever 
induced  him  to  set  foot  in  the  town.  When  he  had  risen 
high  in  the  world,  the  citizens  of  Caldwell  more  than  once 
cordially  invited  him  to  visit  them,  but  their  blandish- 
ments availed  not.  Evidently  his  recollections  of  the 
place  and  people  were  unpleasant. 

When  I  lectured  in  Caldwell  several  years  ago,  a  very 
old  man  told  me  that  he  remembered  well  seeing  the  elder 
Cleveland  start  on  the  long  trek  to  western  New  York 
with  his  wife,  children,  and  all  their  earthly  possessions 
in  a  Conastoga  wagon,  little  Grover  sitting  in  the  rear 
with  his  bare,  chubby  legs  and  feet  dangHng  over  the  hind 
gate. 

He  taught  school  as  soon  as  he  was  old  enough,  read 
law  and  practised  it,  was  elected  sheriff  of  Erie  County, 
served  as  assistant  prosecuting  attorney  by  appointment, 
ran  for  the  office  of  prosecuting  attorney  and  was  de- 
feated, on  a  reform  wave  was  elected  mayor  of  Buffalo 
in  1882  by  a  combination  of  Democrats  and  Independents. 

At  the  beginning  of  that  year  the  betting  would  have 
been  at  least  twenty  to  one  that  the  Republicans  would 
carry  the  state.  They  had  both  United  States  Senators, 
the  Governor,  and  all  the  state  officers,  both  branches  of 
the    Legislature,  and,  to   cap   all,   the   President   of  the 

Vol.  I.— 17 


258   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

United  States,  Chester  A.  Arthur,  with  the  vast  and 
valuable  patronage  pertaining  to  that  office. 

The  Democratic  mayor  of  nearly  every  big  city  in  the 
state  was  a  candidate  for  the  gubernatorial  nomination, 
to  get  their  names  in  the  papers,  and  Cleveland  won. 
When  made,  his  nomination  was  apparently  almost 
worthless. 

In  an  hour,  lucky  for  him  but  fatal  to  the  Republicans, 
President  Arthur  forced  the  nomination  of  his  Secretary 
of  the  Treasury,  Charles  J.  Folger,  a  "Stalwart,"  for 
Governor,  and  it  was  charged  by  the  **Featherheads," 
or  "Half-breeds,"  that  a  telegraphic  proxy  had  been 
forged  by  the  Stalwarts  to  control  the  State  Committee. 
A  great  uproar  ensued,  and,  notwithstanding  the  facts 
that  Folger  was  a  man  of  high  character  and  was  univer- 
sally conceded  to  have  been  an  able  judge  of  the  state's 
Supreme  Court,  they  would  have  none  of  him,  and  on 
Election  Day  either  bolted  openly  or  sulked  in  their  tents. 
Consequently  Cleveland  was  elected  by  a  plurality  of 
one  hundred  and  ninety-two  thousand,  unprecedented  till 
then,  and  his  road  to  the  White  House  was  clear.  Though 
his  plurality  was  one  hundred  and  ninety-two  thousand, 
he  ran  eight  thousand  behind  David  Bennett  Hill,  who 
was  the  candidate  for  lieutenant-governor  on  the  same 
ticket  with  him,  but  by  some  queer  and  convenient  lapse 
of  memory  his  biographers  fail  to  mention  that  small  but 
interesting  fact. 

In  1884  the  Democrats  set  aside  their  old  and  tried 
leaders  and  nominated  him  for  President.  All  they 
wanted  was  a  man  who  could  be  elected,  and  his  enor- 
mous plurality  for  Governor  in  1882  caused  them  to 
believe  that  he  would  be  a  sure  winner.  As  a  matter  of 
fact  he  won  by  a  scratch,  carrying  New  York  by  a 
pluraht)^  of  only  eleven  hundred  and  forty-nine,  thereby 
achieving  the  Presidency.  He  once  told  a  friend  that 
after  his  election  as  Governor  he  had  no  doubt  of  reaching 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  259 

the  White  House.  Quite  naturally  he  believed  in  pre- 
destination. 

He  was  much  given  to  making  epigrams.  His  first  one 
to  become  popular  was,  "Public  office  is  a  public  trust." 
He  never  said  it  that  way.  A  skilful  scribe  took  one  of 
Cleveland's  long-involved  sentences  containing  the  idea 
and  the  words  above  set  out,  but  not  the  foregoing  collo- 
cation, and  by  leaving  out  some  here  and  some  there  pre- 
sented as  the  finished  product  the  epigram  which  aided 
Mr.  Cleveland  very  much  all  his  days.  The  idea  was 
sound  and  the  verbiage  was  catchy,  but  the  fact  an- 
nounced was  not  new.  No  doubt  it  was  used  by  the  first 
honest  man  who  ever  spoke  on  the  subject.  The  con- 
trary has  been  expressed  in  this  wise:  "A  public  office  is 
a  private  snap!"  Somebody  declared  that  certain  other 
men  thought  that. 

His  most  exquisite  phrase,  and  entirely  original,  so  far 
as  I  know,  was  **  Innocuous  desuetude,"  still  frequently 
quoted  and  perhaps  to  be  quoted  as  long  as  our  vernacu- 
lar is  spoken  by  the  children  of  men. 

"The  power  of  pelf"  is  strong,  but  does  not  measure 
up  to  the  two  first  mentioned. 

Another  of  his  famous  mots  is,  "It  is  a  condition  which 
confronts  us — not  a  theory." 

President  Cleveland  was  an  exceedingly  painstaking 
and  industrious  man. 

This  illustration  fell  under  my  personal  observation: 
Senators  Vest  and  Cockrell  and  myself  were  pressing  the 
claims  of  one  of  my  constituents  for  an  important  office, 
and  thought  we  had  about  succeeded.  So  one  morning 
we  went  to  the  White  House  to  clinch  the  matter.  To 
our  surprise  the  President  said,  "There  are  serious 
charges  against  your  man!"  Senator  Vest  inquired: 
"What  are  they?  Who  filed  them,  and  when.?"  Where- 
upon the  President  gave  this  amazing  answer:  "I  do  not 
know  who  filed  them  QX  who  made  them.    I  do  not  know 


26o   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

precisely  when  they  were  filed.  What  I  do  know  is  that 
about  one  o'clock  this  morning  I  went  into  my  office  and 
found  on  my  table  an  anonymous  protest  against  the 
appointment  of  your  candidate,  making  serious  charges 
against  him  and  attaching  as  evidence  of  the  truth  of  the 
charges  about  fifty  pages  of  legal  cap  excerpts  from  court 
records.  I  sat  down  and  read  all  of  it  before  I  went  to 
bed!'; 

Think  of  such  conscientious  labor  by  a  President  of 
the  United  States  at  that  unseemly  hour!  While  millions 
of  his  constituents  slept  he  was  toiling  onward  in  the 
night.  We  borrowed  the  papers  referred  to.  He  had 
not  only  read  them^  but  he  had  read  them  carefully 
enough  to  mark  certain  passages  which  struck  him  forcibly 
and  had  in  a  few  instances  indicated  his  opinions  on  the 
margin ! 

It  required  some  time  and  much  labor  to  disprove  the 
charges  so  as  to  induce  him  to  change  his  mind  and  make 
the  appointment — which  he  finally  did.  It  is  apropos 
to  add  that  our  candidate  was  recommended  for  the  place 
by  nearly  every  prominent  man  in  Missouri. 

I  set  forth  the  foregoing  incident  for  two  purposes: 
First,  to  illustrate  Mr.  Cleveland's  method, of  work;  sec- 
ond, to  disabuse  the  minds  of  sundry  folks  of  an  obsession 
that  public  men  in  Washington  spend  their  days  and 
nights  in  having  a  good  time — merely  that  and  nothing 
more. 

The  Vice-President  elected  with  Mr.  Cleveland  was 
Adlai  E.  Stevenson,  of  IlHnois.  He  was  what  is  called 
**a  Democratic  war-horse."  He  was  certainly  a  Demo- 
crat without  guile  and  without  the  shadow  of  turning. 
Mugwumps  and  Independents  doted  on  Cleveland  while 
they  looked  askance  at  Stevenson,  but  as  they  could  not 
vote  for  the  former  without  also  voting  for  the  latter,  in 
order  to  get  the  former  they  swallowed  the  ticket,  making 
wry  faces  much  after  the  fashion  of  the  pupils  in  Professor 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  261 

Squeers's  "Dotheboys  Hall,"  when  his  spouse  adminis- 
tered to  them  their  morning  dose  of  treacle  and  brimstone. 

Stevenson  was  born  and  bred  in  Kentucky,  looked, 
talked,  and  acted  as  one,  possessed  all  the  distinguishing 
characteristics  of  the  proud,  brave  race  from  which  he 
sprang.  He  graduated  at  or  graduated  from  or,  to  use 
Senator  Henry  Cabot  Lodge's  formula,  he  *Svas  gradu- 
ated from"  Center  College  at  Danville,  of  which  institu- 
tion the  renowned  Dr.  Robert  J.  Breckenridge,  one-third 
preacher,  one-third  scholar,  and  one-third  poHtician,  was 
president.  Among  Stevenson's  classmates  were  Mr.  Jus- 
tice John  Marshall  Harlan,  Senator  George  Graham  Vest, 
of  Missouri,  Senator  Joseph  C.  S.  Blackburn,  of  Ken- 
tucky, Col.  William  C.  P.  Breckenridge,  and  Col.  Robert 
J.  Breckenridge — certainly  a  brilliant  coterie  of  students 
in  one  small  college.  Doctor  Breckenridge  was  at  first  a 
lawyer.  Thomas  F.  Marshall,  most  brilliant  of  mortals, 
said:  "Dick  Menifee  drove  me  to  the  bottle  and  Cousin 
Bob  Breckenridge  to  the  pulpit,  and  I  have  stuck  to  my 
job  closer  than  Bob  has  to  his,"  which  was  the  literal 
truth.  Doctor  Breckenridge  was  temporary  chairman 
of  the  convention  which  nominated  Lincoln  and  Johnson. 

General  Stevenson  was  a  successful  and  resourceful 
lawyer.  Like  most  country  lawyers,  he  practised  politics 
about  as  much  as  he  practised  his  profession — his  pro- 
fession for  profit,  politics  for  sheer  joy.  He  was  one  of 
the  most  popular  campaigners  in  the  land,  and  was  the 
delight  of  the  multitude.  Stevenson  always  spoke  right 
out  in  meeting  and  did  not  mince  his  words. 

One  thing  that  commended  him  to  his  audiences  was 
his  handsome  presence.  Tall,  slender,  erect,  graceful, 
well  knit,  lean  of  flank,  he  always  reminded  me  of  a 
Kentucky  race-horse.  His  information  was  wide  and 
varied,  his  voice  musical  and  far-carrying,  his  elocution 
good,  and  he  was  not  afraid.  He  had  the  nose,  eye,  and 
chin  of  a  fighter,  which  he  was. 


262   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

He  had  made  four  races  for  Congress,  winning  two  out 
of  four. 

During  Cleveland's  first  term  he  was  the  Assistant  Post- 
master-General, who  had  charge  of  the  appointment  of 
postmasters.  He  flung  RepubHcans  out  and  put  Demo- 
crats in  with  such  expedition  that  those  who  loved  him 
not  dubbed  him  "The  Headsman"  or  "The  Axman." 
Hence  the  feud  betwixt  him  and  the  civil-service  reform^ 
ers.  They  regarded  him  as  a  bad  man  from  Bitter  Creek, 
but  he  was  the  idol  of  hoi  polloi.  They  loved  him  for  the 
enemies  he  had  made.  They  would  much  rather  have 
had  him  in  the  White  House  than  Grover  Cleveland,  and 
looked  forward  eagerly  to  a  time  when  he  would  reside  in 
that  garish  but  greatly  coveted  mansion. 

He  and  President  Cleveland  were  not  at  all  chummy. 
Quite  the  contrary.  The  heir-apparent  and  the  king  are 
rarely  close  friends.  Practically  the  same  is  true  with 
Presidents  and  Vice-Presidents.  This  situation  grows 
out  of  the  nature  of  things.  "Watchful  waiting"  for  a 
dead  man's  shoes  is  a  gruesome  occupation. 

General  Stevenson  presided  over  the  Senate  with  grace, 
dignity,  and  impartiality.  Being  a  first-class  raconteur, 
he  was  a  prime  favorite  with  the  Senators. 

HARRIS,    OF   TENNESSEE 

When  I  first  entered  the  House  of  Representatives,  one 
of  the  ablest,  and  certainly  the  most  picturesque  man  in 
the  Senate  was  ex-Governor  Isham  Green  Harris,  of  Ten- 
nessee. In  many  ways  he  was  the  Democratic  leader  of 
that  body.  More  than  any  other  one  man,  he  took  the 
state  of  Tennessee  into  the  Confederacy.  He  was,  per- 
haps, the  ablest  of  the  war  governors — in  the  Confederacy, 
at  any  rate. 

He  performed  one  of  the  most  remarkable  feats  in  that 
remarkable  era,  by  carrying  around  with  him,  during  the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  263 

entire  war,  in  camp  and  field,  six  hundred  and  fifty- 
thousand  dollars  belonging  to  the  public-school  fund  of 
Tennessee.  He  even  carried  it  with  him  into  Mexico 
during  his  brief  expatriation  after  the  Confederacy  had 
collapsed,  but  he  finally  restored  every  dollar  of  it  to  the 
proper  officials. 

He  and  the  celebrated  "Parson"  Brownlow  were  at 
loggerheads,  politically.  The  "Parson,"  who  was  a  mili- 
tant Christian,  was  Governor  of  the  "Old  Volunteer 
State"  during  the  days  of  "Reconstruction,"  and  after- 
ward was  United  States  Senator. 

While  the  "Parson"  was  Governor,  the  state  Legislature 
passed  a  resolution  authorizing  and  directing  the  Governor 
to  oflFer  a  reward  of  five  thousand  dollars  for  the  arrest 
and  delivery  of  Governor  Harris  to  Governor  Brownlow; 
and  accordingly  Governor  Brownlow  issued  his  procla- 
mation, accusing  Harris  of  treason  and  other  high  crimes 
and  misdemeanors.  It  was  a  bitter  document,  and  con- 
tained this  descriptio  personce  of  Governor  Harris: 

"This  culprit,  Harris,  is  about  five  feet  ten  inches  high, 
weighs  about  one  hundred  and  forty-five  pounds,  and  is 
about  fifty-five  years  of  age.  His  complexion  is  sallow — 
his  eyes  are  dark  and  penetrating — a  perfect  index  to 
the  heart  of  a  traitor — with  the  scowl  and  frown  of  a 
demon  resting  on  his  brow.  The  study  of  mischief,  and 
the  practice  of  crime,  have  brought  upon  him  premature 
baldness  and  gray  beard.  With  brazen-faced  impudence 
he  talks  loudly  and  boastingly  about  the  overthrow  of  the 
Yankee  army,  and  entertains  no  doubt  but  the  South  will 
achieve  her  independence.  He  chews  tobacco  rapidly 
and  is  inordinately  fond  of  liquor.  In  his  moral  struct- 
ure he  is  an  unscrupulous  man — steeped  to  the  nose  and 
chin  in  personal  and  political  profligacy — now  about  lost 
to  all  sense  of  honor  and  shame — ^with  a  heart  reckless  of 
social  duty  and  fatally  bent  upon  mischief. 

"If  captured,  he  will  be  found  lurking  in  the  rebel  strong- 


264   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

holds  of  Mississippi,  Alabama,  or  Georgia,  and  in  female 
society,  alleging  with  the  sheep-faced  modesty  of  a  vir- 
tuous man  that  it  is  not  a  wholesome  state  of  public 
sentiment,  or  of  taste,  that  forbids  an  indiscriminate 
mixing  together  of  married  men  and  women.  If  capt- 
ured, the  fugitive  must  be  delivered  to  me  alive,  to  the 
end  that  justice  may  be  done  him  here,  upon  the  theater 
of  his  former  villainous  deeds." 

Now,  anybody  reading  that  severe  arraignment  would 
naturally  conclude  that  if  the  "Fighting  Parson,"  in  his 
capacity  as  Governor,  had  ever  got  his  clutches  on  Gov- 
ernor Harris,  he  would  have  inflicted  some  awful  punish- 
ment on  him — perhaps  death;  but  the  son  of  Governor 
Brownlow,  Col.  John  B.  Brownlow,  writes  to  me  the 
following  account  of  what  really  happened: 

"In  1866,  Neill  S.  Brown,  who  was  elected  Governor 
as  a  Whig,  in  1847,  and  later,  under  Taylor's  administra- 
tion, was  Ministe'r  to  Russia,  came  to  my  father  (Governor 
Brownlow)  with  a  letter  from  Harris  to  him.  Brown.  It 
read:  *I  wish  to  return  to  my  home.  My  family  need 
me;  1  wish  to  resume  the  practice  of  the  law,  but  I  would 
not  feel  it  safe  to  do  so  without  a  pledge  of  protection 
from  the  President  of  the  United  States  or  the  Governor 
of  Tennessee.  I  would  rather  die  in  exile  than  ask  or 
receive  a  favor  at  the  hands  of  Andrew  Johnson.  I  am 
willing  to  ask  it  of  Governor  Brownlow,  confident  that 
he  will  do  whatever  be  promises  to  do.' 

"When  my  father  read  this  letter,  he  said:  *Tell  Harris 
to  come  home.  Johnson  has  released  many  men  as 
reprehensible  for  the  part  they  took  in  the  war  as  Harris, 
without  Harris's  good  qualities.  He  shall  not  be  arrested 
if  I  can  prevent  it,  and  for  the  purpose  I  will,  if  necessary, 
turn  states'  rights  advocate.' 

"Harris  returned,  got  to  Nashville  at  midnight  on 
Saturday  v/ithout  any  one  knowing  he  had  returned,  and 
called  on  the  Governor  Sunday  morning.     He  asked  the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  265 

Governor  what  steps  he  proposed  to  take  for  his  pro- 
tection. 

"He  replied,  *I  have  already  taken  them.  I  have  seen 
Glascock,  the  U.  S.  Marshal  for  Middle  Tennessee,  an 
old  Whig  friend  of  mine,  and  he  pledges  me  he  will  not 
interfere  with  you.  More  important  than  that,  I  have 
seen  Gen.  George  H.  Thomas,  the  commander  of  this 
department,  and  he  promises  me  he  will  not  interfere 
with  or  arrest  you.' 

"*But,'  said  Harris,  'what  about  the  state's  attorney 
in  my  district  in  west  Tennessee?' 

"My  father  replied:  *I  have  attended  to  that.  After 
the  quarrel  between  Jackson  and  Calhoun  over  nullifica- 
tion, the  Legislature  of  Tennessee,  under  Jackson's  in- 
spiration, passed  a  law  that  rebellion  against  the  govern- 
ment of  the  United  States  was  treason  to  the  state,  and 
providing  drastic  penalties  for  the  same.  After  seces- 
sion our  Confederate  Legislature  repealed  that  law,  but 
the  Republican  Legislature  and  the  government  at  Wash- 
ington did  not  recognize  the  legality  of  anything  done  by 
the  Rebel  Legislatures.' 

"Harris  referred  to  that  law  that  the  state  attorney 
under  it  might  have  him  presented  to  the  grand  jury 
and  indicted. 

"The  Governor  replied:  *I  have  attended  to  that.  I 
appointed  the  state  attorney  to  his  office.  He  is  my 
friend.  I  have  written  him  not  to  interfere  with  you, 
and  I  am  sure  he  will  not.' 

"Harris  replied:  'Governor  Brownlow,  you  have  taken 
every  possible  means  for  my  protection.  I  shall  go  home 
to  resume  my  law  practice  feehng  assured  of  not  being 
interfered  with.'" 

STORY   OF  THE    STILL 

Colonel  Brownlow,  who  speaks  in  the  most  kindly  and 
eulogistic  terms  of  Senator  Harris,  declaring,  among  other 


266   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

things,  that  "he  had  as  great  physical  and  moral  courage 
as  any  man  that  ever  Hved,"  tells  this  refreshing  and 
characteristic  story  of  the  Senator  and  Gen.  Joe  Shelby, 
of  Missouri: 

"During  the  second  term  of  President  Cleveland  a 
visitor  came  to  the  Democratic  side  of  the  Senate  Chamber 
and  asked  the  watchman  at  that  door  to  call  out  Senator 
Harris,  of  Tennessee,  saying: 

"*It  will  not  be  necessary  for  me  to  send  in  my  card, 
as  I  am  an  old  friend  of  Senator  Harris/ 

"The  doorkeeper  delivered  the  message,  and  Senator 
Harris  soon  came  out  into  the  dimly  lighted  corridor.  As 
soon  as  he  appeared  the  visitor  grasped  his  hand,  saying: 

"'Governor  Flarris,  I  am  mighty  glad  to  see  you.* 

"*I  am  glad  to  greet  you,  sir,'  said  Senator  Harris, 
hesitatingly,  and  intently  peering  at  the  caller. 

"'Governor,  you  don't  seem  to  remember  me,'  said 
the  visitor,  adding,  'and  I  am  an  old  friend  of  yours.' 

"'I  am  very  sorry,  sir,'  replied  Senator  Harris,  'but  it 
is  my  misfortune  that  I  cannot  remember  the  faces  of 
all  of  my  friends,  although  I  wish  that  I  could  do  so.' 

'"Of  course  I  understand  that,  Senator,'  answered  the 
visitor,  'for  it  would  be  impossible  for  you  to  remember 
the  face  of  one  man  in  five  hundred  or  in  a  thousand  of 
those  to  whom  your  name  and  face  are  perfectly  familiar, 
but  I  supposed  that  you  would  remember  me,  for  we  were 
once  partners  in  business.' 

"The  Tennessee  Senator,  who  became  irritable  and 
irascible  in  his  latter  years,  tartly  replied: 

'"My  memory  and  eyesight  may  not  be  as  good  as 
formerly,  but  I'll  be  damned  if  I  could  forget  any  man 
that  ever  was  my  partner  in  business.' 

"'Why,  Governor  Harris,'  said  the  visitor,  earnestly, 
*I  can  easily  prove  that  we  were  in  business  together. 
You  may  be  ashamed  of  the  business,  but  still  we  were 
partners.' 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  267 

"'Damn  you,  sir,  explain  yourself/  angrily  retorted 
the  now  enraged  Tennessee  statesman.  *1  was  never 
engaged  in  any  business  of  which  I  was  ashamed  or  of 
which  I  am  now  ashamed.     What  do  you  mean.?' 

^* Maintaining  composure  and  confident  suavity,  the 
visitor  then  said: 

***You  remember.  Governor,  do  you  not,  that  when 
General  Lee  surrendered,  in  1865,  many  of  us  old  Con- 
federates deemed  it  prudent  to  expatriate  ourselves?' 

"*Yes,  I  remember  that,'  replied  the  Tennessean,  show- 
ing renewed  interest  in  his  caller. 

***Well,  at  that  time  Gen.  Sterling  Price,  you,  and  I 
happened  to  meet  at  a  dirty,  greasy  little  hotel  at  Cor- 
dova, Mexico.  We  all  were  low-spirited,  not  certain  that 
we  might  ever  again  see  our  wives  and  children.  There 
was  no  bar,  nor  any  visible  means  of  reviving  our  droop- 
ing spirits  with  Hbatory  spirits,  and  the  situation  was 
desperate.  I  told  you  and  General  Price  that  I  had 
worked  in  a  distillery  in  Missouri,  and  that  if  I  could  get 
a  copper  still  I  could  make  all  of  the  pineapple  brandy 
that  we  needed. 

"'You  and  General  Price  furnished  the  money,  giving 
me  a  third  interest  in  the  business,  and  I  proceeded  to 
produce  all  of  the  brandy  that  we  needed.' 

"*Joe  Shelby,  by  Jove!'  exclaimed  Senator  Harris,  as 
he  heartily  grasped  the  hand  of  his  caller,  and  further 
said: 

"'Sure  enough,  we  were  partners  in  business,  and  I  am 
not  ashamed  of  that  business,  either.  I  beg  your  pardon, 
Joe,  for  not  remembering  you.  Now  tell  me,  Joe,  if  there 
is  anything  that  I  can  do  for  you?' 

"Gen.  Joe  Shelby  told  Senator  Harris  that  President 
Cleveland  had  selected  him  for  the  office  of  United  States 
Marshal  for  Missouri,  and  added : 

"'The  other  candidates  for  the  job  threaten  to  prevent 
my  confirmation  by  the  Senate,  because  they  claim  that 


268   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

I  am  in  the  habit  of  drinking  too  much  whisky.  I  do 
drink  a  httle,  but  never  to  excess.' 

"*I  drink  a  httle,  too,'  rephed  Senator  Harris,  'and  I 
don't  care  a  continental  if  you  do  the  same  as  I  do  in 
that  regard.     Your  nomination  shall  be  confirmed.'  " 

Colonel  Brownlow  further  informs  me  that  Gen.  Joe 
Shelby  was  confirmed,  and  that  he  held  that  office  during 
the  remainder  of  his  days,  and  that  this  story  of  those 
days  gone  by  has  not  been  given  to  any  other  maker  of 
the  leaves  of  history. 


CHAPTER  X 

Reed  and  Crisp. 

THERE  have  been  a  few  striking  rivalries  in  American 
politics,  the  most  memorable  being  Jefferson  and 
Hamilton,  Jackson  and  Clay,  Lincoln  and  Douglas,  Blaine 
and  Conkling.  There  can  be  no  question  that  the  current 
of  our  history  was  largely  influenced  by  these  lifelong 
political  rivalries,  to  which  was  added  the  element  of 
intense  personal  hate,  except  in  the  case  of  Lincoln  and 
Douglas,  who  were  friends  always  from  the  day  when 
they,  as  mere  boys,  were  sworn  in  together  as  members 
of  the  lUinois  legislature.  This  friendship  was  the  cause 
of  an  act  much  commented  on  at  the  time — the  gracious 
conduct  of  Douglas  at  Lincoln's  first  inauguration.  Lin- 
coln, who  was  an  awkward  man,  was  bothered  as  to  how 
to  dispose  of  his  hat.  Douglas  gracefully  stepped  for- 
ward and  held  the  silk  tile  of  his  successful  rival  while 
he  delivered  his  inaugural  address.  No  human  power 
could  have  induced  Hamilton,  Clay,  or  Conkling  to  ren- 
der such  kindly  service  to  their  rivals. 

In  the  rivalries  just  mentioned  the  whole  nation  was 
the  theater  and  the  Presidency  was  the  glittering  and 
greatly  coveted  prize  for  which  they  contested. 

There  was  a  notable  rivalry  on  a  smaller  field — the 
House  of  Representatives — and  for  a  great  but  smaller 
prize,  the  Speakership — betwixt  Charles  Frederick  Crisp, 
of  Georgia,  and  Thomas  Brackett  Reed,  of  Maine.  They 
.were  thrice  pitted  against  each  other  as  the  nominee  of 


270   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

their  parties  for  the  Speakership,  Crisp  winning  two  out 
of  three.  The  defeated  nominee  for  the  Speakership  be- 
comes, through  immemorial  usage,  ipso  facto  minority 
leader.  Consequently,  during  both  of  Crisp's  terms  in 
the  chair.  Reed  was  minority  leader,  as  was  Crisp  dur- 
ing his  last  term  in  the  House.  These  two  men  were 
commonly  pitted  against  each  other  in  public  estimation, 
and,  though  of  very  different  characteristics  and  mental 
endowments,  they  were  not  unequally  matched. 

While  the  House  of  the  Fifty-third  Congress  was  in- 
harmonious, quarrelsome,  and  factional — considered  as  to 
its  personnel — it  was  a  great  body.  Toward  its  close  the 
venerable  Jehu  Baker,  of  Illinois,  whose  chief  distinction 
was  that  he  defeated  Col.  Wilham  R.  Morrison  for  a  seat 
in  the  House,  told  me  that  he  had  served  in  the  House 
off  and  on — mostly  off — ^for  a  quarter  of  a  century,  in- 
cluding the  famous  Forty-fourth  Congress,  which  was 
exploited  widely  as  containing  all  the  talents,  and  that 
in  his  judgment  the  House  of  the  Fifty-third  Congress 
possessed  the  highest  average  ability  of  all  the  Houses 
in  which  he  had  sat. 

Mr.  Speaker  Charles  Frederick  Crisp,  of  Georgia,  was 
the  most  influential  personage  in  that  House  in  whose 
membership  were  so  many  men  distinguished  then  or 
thereafter.  Among  them  were  four  men  destined  to  be 
candidates  for  the  Presidency — ^Thomas  Brackett  Reed, 
Richard  Parks  Bland,  William  Jennings  Bryan,  and 
myself,  and  a  future  Vice-President,  James  Schoolcraft 
Sherman.  Side  by  side  with  us  sat  sixteen  generals  of 
the  Civil  War,  ranging  from  Joseph  Wheeler,  a  Confed- 
erate lieutenant-general,  to  brevet  brigadiers.  The 
military  element  was  numerous  and  capable.  Colonels, 
lieutenant-colonels,  majors,  captains,  lieutenants,  ser- 
geants, corporals,  and  privates  were  thick  as  autumnal 
leaves.  Ex-Governors  and  Governors-to-be,  future  Cabi- 
net Ministers,  and  representatives  to  foreign  courts,  ^ 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  271 

large  brood  of  embryo  United  States  Senators,  college 
presidents  and  professors,  judges  of  every  degree,  past 
or  future,  editors,  lawyers,  great  and  small,  two  preachers, 
one  poet,  and  one  ex-United  States  Senator,  answered  the 
roll-call.  The  only  Greek  ever  in  Congress — Miller  of 
Wisconsin — ^was  a  member.  His  mother  and  father  were 
both  killed  in  the  battle  in  which  Markos  Bozzaris  went  to 
his  heroic  death  and  to  immortal  glory.  An  American 
couple — the  Millers — picked  the  baby  orphan  up  on  the 
bloody  field,  and,  not  knowing  his  name,  gave  him  their 
own  and  adopted  him  as  their  son.  David  Gardner 
Tyler,  son  of  President  John  Tyler,  was  conspicuous. 
He  is  one  of  three  presidential  sons  to  serve  in  the  House, 
the  other  two  being  Scott  Harrison,  son  of  President 
William  Henry  Harrison  and  father  of  Gen.  Benjamin 
Harrison,  and  John  Quincy  Adams,  who  served  in  the 
Senate  before  he  was  President  and  in  the  House  for 
seventeen  and  one-half  years  after  he  left  the  White 
House,  dying  with  harness  on  his  back — as  no  doubt  he 
preferred  to  die. 

Mr.  Speaker  Crisp  was  of  right  head  of  the  House.  His 
vast  influence  grew  out  of  his  strong  personality,  coupled 
with  the  tremendous  and  abnormal  powers  then  centered 
in  the  hands  of  the  Speaker.  At  that  time  the  Speaker 
appointed  the  committees,  which  enabled  him  not  only 
to  largely  shape  legislation,  but  to  retard  or  promote  the 
careers  of  members,  except  the  careers  of  the  strongest, 
who  could  not  be  kept  down.  His  position  as  ex-officio 
chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Rules  of  five  members, 
two  Democrats  and  two  Republicans,  made  him  practi- 
cally the  whole  Committee  on  Rules  and  gave  him  a 
tremendous  leverage  on  the  business  of  the  House. 

Mr.  Speaker  Crisp  was  not  a  brilliant  man.  He  was 
able,  level-headed,  dependable,  vigilant,  urbane,  and 
courageous.  He  was  not  an  orator,  but  was  a  strong, 
clear,  luminous  speaker.     He  was  of  middle  size,  about 


272   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

five  feet  ten  in  stature,  weighing  about  one  hundred  and 
seventy-five  pounds,  with  a  round  face,  a  large,  shapely 
head,  clear  gray  eyes,  dark  complexion,  dark  mustache, 
sparse  dark  hair — altogether  a  good-looking  man.  His 
father  and  mother  were  actors  and  he  was  born  in  England 
while  they  were  residing  there  temporarily — which  ren- 
dered him  eligible  to  the  Presidency  as  though  born  in 
America,  as  his  parents  were  Americans. 

He  was  a  youthful  soldier  in  the  Confederate  army 
and  had  a  good  record  in  that  regard.  He  was  a  success- 
ful lawyer  and  had  long  been  a  nisi  prius  judge. 

He  was  nominated  for  Speaker  in  the  Fifty-third  Con- 
gress without  opposition,  but  he  achieved  the  nomina- 
tion for  the  Speakership  in  the  Fifty-second  Congress, 
after  a  long  and  most  bitter  fight.  It  was  a  great  field — 
Charles  Frederick  Crisp,  of  Georgia;  Roger  Q.  Mills,  of 
Texas,  subsequently  a  United  States  Senator;  Benton 
McMillan,  of  Tennessee,  afterward  Governor  of  his  state 
as  well  as  envoy  extraordinary  and  minister  plenipo- 
tentiary to  Peru;  WilKam  M.  Springer,  of  IlHnois,  sub- 
sequently a  judge  in  the  Indian  Territory;  Judge  William 
S.  Holman,  "the  great  objector,"  universally  called 
**  Watch-Dog  of  the  Treasury";  and  Col.  William  Henry 
Hatch,  of  Missouri,  the  man  who  breathed  the  breath  of 
life  into  the  nostrils  of  the  nascent  Committee  on 
Agriculture. 

As  soon  as  it  was  ascertained  that  the  Democrats  had 
elected  a  majority  of  the  House  of  the  Fifty-second  Con- 
gress, the  country  at  large  assumed  that  Roger  Q.  Mills 
would  be  Speaker  thereof.  For  years  he  had  been  to 
the  fore  in  Congress.  He  was  a  crack  debater,  a  favorite 
of  Speaker  CarHsle,  the  personification  of  Tariff  Reform, 
and  had  been  chairman  of  the  great  Committee  on  Ways 
and  Means,  fastening  his  name  on  "The  Mills  Tariff 
Bill,"  which  was  indorsed  by  a  national  Democratic 
convention.     He  was   a   fine   figure  physically  and  the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  273 

Murat  of  the  army  of  tariff-reformers.  Safe  to  say  that 
he  was,  next  to  Carlisle,  the  most  popular  man  in  America 
with  the  rank  and  file  of  Democrats. 

On  the  other  hand,  Crisp  was  not  widely  known.  His 
fellow-Representatives  and  other  observing  folks  in  Wash- 
ington had  a  high  opinion  of  Crisp,  and  considered  him 
a  rising  man  of  great  ability.  It  was  a  long-drawn-out 
fight.  From  the  beginning,  the  knowing  ones  felt  that 
the  contest  was  betwixt  Mills  and  Crisp.  With  all  his 
popularity  and  prominence.  Mills  labored  under  certain 
handicaps.  He  was  credited  with  a  too  peppery  temper; 
by  some  he  was  accounted  as  too  extreme  as  a  tariff 
reformer,  and  was  charged  by  the  out-and-out  Free-Sil- 
verites  with  having  gone  out  of  his  way  in  the  Ohio 
campaign  of  1890  to  make  a  single  gold  standard  speech. 
Crisp's  strength  in  the  House  rested  on  the  game  fight 
he  had  made  against  the  Reed  rules,  his  splendid  handling 
of  election  cases,  and  his  reputation  for  moderateness, 
level-headedness,  and  unfailing  good  temper.  One  by  one 
the  candidates  dropped  out  until  only  Crisp,  Mills,  and 
Springer  were  left.  Springer,  with  a  small  bunch  of  fol- 
lowers, held  the  balance  of  power.  On  the  night  before 
the  finish  Springer  sent  word  to  Crisp  that  he  and  his 
faithful  band  would  go  in  a  body  to  Crisp  provided  he 
would  make  Springer  chairman  of  the  Ways  and  Means 
Committee,  and  also  make  William  Jennings  Bryan,  a 
first-termer  from  Nebraska,  a  member  thereof.  Crisp 
declined,  but  next  morning  on  the  first  ballot  he  came 
so  near  defeat  that  he  sent  a  trusted  friend  to  Springer, 
and  accepted  his  proposition.  Many  persons  have  been 
puzzled  to  understand  why  Bryan,  a  new  and  unknown 
member,  was  placed  on  Ways  and  Means,  to  the  exclu- 
sion of  able  old  members.  The  foregoing  is  an  explana- 
tion which  explains. 

My  first  verdict  on  Speaker  Crisp  was  expressed  in  a 
letter  to  my  wife,  in  these  words;   "Crisp  is  a  big  man, 

Vol.  I.— 18 


274   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

bigger  than  his  reputation,  with  a  big  body,  a  big  mouth, 
and  a  large  head  full  of  brains.'*  I  have  had  no  reason 
to  change  that  first  impression.  He  had  no  wit,  no  fancy, 
no  eloquence.  He  did  not  adorn  his  speeches  with  anec- 
dote, poetic  quotation,  classic  allusion,  or  historic  illus- 
tration. Nevertheless,  he  invariably  delivered  a  strong 
address.  His  style  of  speaking  was  what  might  not  be 
inaptly  called  the  "judicial,"  acquired  by  a  long  occu- 
pancy of  the  bench.  He  was  endowed  with  abundant 
physical  courage  and  men  had  implicit  faith  in  his  in- 
tegrity and  common  sense,  which,  after  all,  is  the  best 
sort  of  sense. 

Like  most  men,  he  had  a  temper  of  his  own.  I  never 
saw  him  thoroughly  angered  on  but  three  occasions — 
once  when  Mr.  Reed  would  not  come  to  order  till  the 
sergeant-at-arms  was  commanded  to  arrest  him,  once 
when  Mr.  Boutelle,  of  Maine,  became  obstreperous  on 
the  Hawaiian  question  and  was  about  to  precipitate  a 
riot,  and  again  when  Col.  John  T.  Heard,  of  Missouri, 
and  Col.  William  C.  P.  Breckenridge,  of  Kentucky,  had 
their  celebrated  and  spectacular  row  in  the  House. 

Speaker  Crisp  demonstrated  his  patriotic  sense  of  duty 
oy  declining  a  United  States  Senatorship  for  an  unex- 
pired term  when  tendered  him  by  the  Governor  of  Georgia. 
It  was  certainly  a  tempting  offer — the  realization  of  his 
ambition — but  because  he  thought  that  he  could  be  of 
more  service  to  his  party  and  his  country  in  the  Speaker's 
chair,  with  self-abnegation,  rare  among  men,  he  refused 
the  exalted  honor — which  action  doubled  his  influence  in 
the  House.  It  is  pleasant  to  remember  that  after  his 
career  as  Speaker  ended  he  was  nominated  by  the  Georgia 
Democrats  for  a  full  term  in  the  Senate,  a  nomination 
being  equivalent  to  an  election,  but  it  is  sad  to  relate 
that  he  died  before  he  could  take  his  seat. 

Shortly  after  I  was  sworn  in,  one  morning  I  was  lean- 
ing against  the  Speaker's  stand,  talking  to  Speaker  Crisp, 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  275 

while  a  very  dry  member  was  delivering  a  very  dry  speech 
on  a  very  dry  question  of  personal  privilege.  I  said, 
"Mr.  Speaker,  how  did  that  man  break  into  Congress?"^ 
He  replied,  **When  you  first  look  over  a  new  House  you 
wonder  how  half  of  them  got  there,  but  after  you  come 
to  know  the  members  well  you  will  find  that,  barring  a 
few  accidental  members,  they  are  strong  in  specialties'' — 
a  saying  so  wise  that  it  deserves  to  rank  with  King  Solo- 
mon's Proverbs  or  Lord  Bacon's  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients. 
Speaker  Crisp's  sizing  up  of  the  House  is  the  reverse  of 
the  estimate  of  the  Senate  by  the  witty  Senator  Nesmith, 
of  Oregon.  When  he  returned  home  for  his  first  vacation 
one  of  his  constituents  asked  him  what  he  thought  of  the 
Senate.  Nesmith  replied,  **The  first  month  I  was  there 
I  wondered  how  I  ever  broke  in,  and  ever  since  I  have 
been  wondering  how  the  rest  of  them  broke  in!"  While 
Speaker  Crisp  did  not  make  many  epigrams,  here  is  one 
of  his  coinage  which  is  a  gem.  Speaking  of  Speaker  Reed, 
he  said:  "The  unquestioning  loyalty  of  the  Republicans 
to  Reed  reminds  me  of  the  Hindu,  who,  kneehng  in  prayer 
before  his  idol,  consoles  himself  with  the  idea  that  he 
knows  his  God  is  ugly  and  thinks  he  is  great." 

For  a  score  of  years  there  was  a  masterful,  scintillating 
aurora-boreaHs  statesman,  known  as  "the  Man  from 
Maine,"  who  strove  with  marvelous  dexterity  for  the 
glittering  prize  of  the  Presidency,  who  kept  the  country 
in  a  turmoil  for  nearly  a  generation  with  his  ambition, 
and  who  finally  went  to  his  grave  cut  off  before  his  time, 
bitterly  disappointed,  if  not  broken-hearted. 

A  more  briUiant  man  never  figured  in  American  politics 
than  James  Gillespie  Blaine.  His  friends  are  fond  of 
comparing  him  to  Henry  Clay,  and  indeed  the  two  careers 
are  filled  with  startling  parallels. 

Sometimes  we  build  more  wisely  than  we  know. 
Through  the  idiocy  of  Burchard's  fatal  speech  of  three 
words  Qf  allit;eiration;^  Bl^inq  lost;  the  Presidency  of  th^ 


276   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Republic,  but  he  wrote  a  book  which  will  perpetuate  his 
fame  long  after  half  the  Presidents  have  been  forgotten. 
In  my  judgment  it  is  the  best  historical  work  ever  written 
by  an  American. 

There  was  another  "Man  from  Maine,"  a  giant,  intel- 
lectually and  physically,  ambitious  as  Lucifer,  with  his 
covetous  eyes  constantly  fixed  on  the  chair  of  Washing- 
ton and  the  mantle  of  Jefferson,  straining  every  nerve 
to  become  Chief  Magistrate  of  the  RepubHc,  and  doomed 
by  his  geographical  habitat  to  follow  "the  Plumed 
Knight"  to  the  tomb,  full  of  chagrin  and  bitter  thoughts. 

Intellectually,  Thomas  Brackett  Reed,  like  another 
King  Saul,  towered  head  and  shoulders  above  his  Repub- 
lican competitors. 

These  two  "Men  from  Maine"  did  not  love  each  other 
with  the  fervor  of  Jonathan  and  David  or  of  Damon  and 
Pythias.  Blaine  managed  men  by  what  the  French  call 
finesse.  Reed  was  direct  in  his  methods,  and  accompHshed 
his  ends  by  main  strength.  Blaine  was  a  money-maker; 
Reed  was  not  blest  with  much  of  this  world's  goods. 
Blaine  was  a  Pennsylvanian;  Reed  was  the  typical  down- 
easter.  Blaine's  influence  was  based  on  personal  mag- 
netism; Reed  appealed  to  the  reason,  the  prejudices,  and 
the  risibilities  of  mankind. 

Blaine  entered  politics  from  the  field  of  journalism; 
Reed  came  fresh  from  the  triumphs  of  the  bar.  People 
loved  Blaine  for  his  charm  of  manner;  they  admired 
Reed  for  his  brain  power.  Both  were  college-bred  men, 
both  served  in  the  state  Legislature,  both  became  Speaker, 
both  were  defeated  candidates  for  the  Presidency,  both 
were  Republicans,  though  if  the  secret  workings  of  their 
lives  were  laid  bare  it  would  probably  be  ascertained 
that  Reed  was  the  more  loyal  party  man.  Both,  how- 
ever, had  tremendous  influence  in  shaping  the  politics  of 
their  party. 

These  are  the  principal  points  of  similarity  and  dissimi- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  '277 

larity  between  the  two  most  illustrious  men  ever  sent 
by  "the  Pine  Tree  State"  to  the  national  councils. 

How  their  enmity  arose  I  know  not.  Certainly  it 
could  not  have  been  rivalry.  The  disparity  in  age  would 
seem  to  preclude  that.  Whether  their  mutual  dislike  in 
any  way  hindered  either  from  securing  that  high  office 
which  they  agreed  in  considering  the  chief  end  of  man, 
is  one  of  those  things  which  nobody  will  find  out  this  side 
of  the  great  Judgment  Day. 

It  is  hardly  possible  that  it  did,  for,  notwithstanding 
Reed's  hatred,  Blaine  always  had  the  Maine  delegation 
solidly  and  enthusiastically  at  his  back  as  long  as  he  was 
a  presidential  candidate,  and  Blaine  died  before  Reed 
became  a  presidential  possibility. 

Reed,  through  the  irony  of  fate,  was  one  of  the  pall- 
bearers at  Blaine's  funeral.  What  Blaine  thought  of 
that — if  he  thinks  at  all  amid  his  present  environments — 
would  make  what  Horace  Greeley  would  have  called 
"very  interesting  reading." 

I  like  fighters — and  to  borrow  the  language  of  Sut 
Lovingood,  Reed  was  a  fighter  from  the  headwaters  of 
Bitter  Creek.  While  in  some  respects  he  was  not  my 
ideal  of  a  man,  yet  the  unvarnished  truth  is  that  when 
he  was  not  posing  for  political  effect  he  was  a  pleasant 
and  companionable  gentleman.  He  was  particularly  for- 
bearing toward  young  members,  which  was  decidedly  to 
his  credit. 

In  personal  appearance  Mr.  Reed  was  unique — a  stu- 
pendous figure — indeed  Brobdingnagian — a  jfact  which 
contributed  to  his  celebrity  and  to  his  commanding 
influence  in  the  House.  He  was  one  of  the  biggest  men 
I  have  ever  seen — big  all  over.  I  have  seen  taller  per- 
sons— for  instance,  Cyrus  A.  SuUaway,  of  New  Hamp- 
shire, and  Albert  S.  Berry,  of  Kentucky,  each  of  whom 
was  6  feet  7  inches,  and  the  Kentucky  giant  and  his  wife, 
each  of  whom  was  7  feet  ii]/2  inches.     I  have  seen  people 


27^      MY   QUARTER   CENTURY   OF 

who  weighed  more — the  fat  woman  in  the  circus  who 
tipped  the  scales  at  600  and  a  colored  man  who  weighed 
720;  but  none  of  these  made  such  an  impression  of  big- 
ness as  Mr.  Reed.  He  stood  6  feet  3  inches  in  his  stock- 
ings, wore  a  No.  12  shoe,  and  weighed  almost  300 
avoirdupois — though  once,  upon  being  asked  his  weight, 
he  replied,  humorously:  "No  gentleman  ever  weighed 
over  two  hundred."  He  had  the  largest  human  face  I 
ever  saw. 

Senator  John  Tyler  Morgan,  of  Alabama,  dubbed  him 
"the  Great  White  Czar,"  a  nickname  that  stuck  and  gave 
the  cartoonists  a  valuable  hint,  which  they  worked  for 
all  it  was  worth.  But  Mr.  Reed  did  not  need  Senator 
Morgan's  characterization  and  the  labors  of  the  cartoon- 
ist to  make  him  a  marked  man  in  any  crowd.  He  was 
one  of  the  few  men  in  public  life  at  whom  strangers  on 
the  street  turned  to  Stare.  He  had  a  massive  two-story 
head,  thatched  with  thin,  flossy,  flaxen  hair,  a  scant 
mustache,  and  a  lily-white  complexion.  This  perfect 
blond  possessed  a  pair  of  large,  brilUant,  black  eyes,  which 
sparkled  with  humor  and  flashed  with  fire,  as  the  spirit 
moved.  He  had  a  clear,  strong,  resonant  voice,  with  a 
distinctive  down-east  twang,  which  filled  the  great  hall 
of  the  House  and  could  be  heard  above  any  uproar.  He 
was  awkward  in  walking.  He  said  that  his  forebears  were 
seafaring  folks,  and  certainly  there  was  something  in  his 
gait  suggestive  of  the  waves  and  the  billows.  On  his 
feet  in  the  full  tide  of  speech,  with  his  vast  bulk  and 
vibrant  tones,  he  literally  compelled  attention,  and  drove 
home  his  propositions  with  the  force  of  a  pile-driver. 

He  was  the  best  short-speech  maker  I  ever  saw  or 
heard.  He  rarely  spoke,  at  length,  and  he  did  not  believe 
that  anybody  else  should  do  so.  He  generally  stopped 
in  five,  ten,  or  fifteen  minutes.  His  speeches  were  strong 
in  proportion  to  their  shortness.  That  sounds  at  first 
like  an  unfriendly  criticism,  but  most  assuredly  I  am  not 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  279 

an  unfriendly  critic.  His  short  speeches  were  of  dynamic 
quality  and  it  is  not  in  the  constitution  of  man  to  digest 
too  much  mental  dynamite  at  one  time. 

The  most  peculiar  thing  about  his  speechmaking  was 
that  he  did  not  want  his  wife  to  hear  him,  and  the  tradi- 
tion is  that  she  never  heard  him  but  once,  and  on  that 
occasion  she  slipped  in  on  him  unawares. 

I  am  indebted  to  him  for  kindness,  promotion,  instruc- 
tion, and  commendation.  Though  no  two  men  ever  sat 
together  in  the  House  who  differed  more  radically  in 
politics  than  he  and  I,  I  am  proud  to  have  counted  him 
among  my  friends. 

Our  friendship  came  about  accidentally.  It  was  for 
some  time  merely  a  speaking  acquaintance.  One  even- 
ing, however,  after  the  lamps  were  lighted,  a  member 
made  some  remarks  derogatory  to  Oklahoma  which  were 
exceedingly  disagreeable  to  me,  as  I  was,  and  am,  very 
fond  of  Oklahoma  and  her  people.  I  replied,  in  the  first 
offhand  speech  I  ever  made  in  the  House.  I  was  expand- 
ing on  my  favorite  theme  of  how  rich  the  land  is  west  of 
the  Mississippi.  I  happened  to  look  over  on  the  Repub- 
lican side  and  observed  that  Mr.  Reed  was  enjoying  my 
extravaganza,  his  huge  face  shining  like  a  harvest  moon, 
which  moved  me  to  say:  "When  Mr.  Speaker  Thomas 
B.  Reed,  of  Maine,  first  traveled  through  that  part  of 
the  country  and  observed  the  fatness  of  the  land,  he 
threw  up  his  hands  in  astonishment  and  exclaimed:  *My 
God !  this  soil  is  so  rich  that,  if  they  had  it  in  New  England, 
they  would  sell  it  by  the  peck  for  seed!'"  He  joined 
heartily  in  the  explosion  of  laughter  which  followed. 
The  next  morning  he  came  rolHng  past  my  desk  and 
said,  "Young  man,  that  was  a  charming  speech  you 
made  last  night!"  Of  course  I  was  greatly  pleased,  for 
"  approbation  from  Sir  Hubert  Stanley  is  praise  indeed."  I 
thanked  him  most  cordially,  and  ever  after  cultivated 
him  when  occasion  offered.     1  set  it  down  here  most 


28o   MY  QUARTER  .CENTURY  OF 

gratefully  that  his  conversation  greatly  augmented  my 
stock  of  knowledge  and  has  benefited  me  ever  since. 

Some  months  after  the  Democrats  had  gone  to  pieces 
on  the  Silver  question,  I  was  passing  Mr.  Reed's  desk, 
when  he  asked  me  how  I  was  succeeding  in  matters  of 
patronage.     I  told  him  that  I  was  in  the  sad  condition  of 

Old  Mother  Hubbard 
Who  went  to  the  cupboard 

To  get  her  poor  doggie  a  bone, 
But  when  she  got  there 
The  cupboard  was  bare 

And  so  the  poor  doggie  got  none. 

He  said,  "That  will  do  you  no  harm.  The  only  Presi- 
dent I  could  ever  get  any  patronage  from  was  General 
Arthur,  but,  nevertheless,  I  have  done  very  well." 

I  replied,  "Notwithstanding  the  President's  hostility 
to  the  Silver  Democrats,  if  what  I  heard  about  him 
touching  the  tariff  is  true,  he  deserves  well  of  the  country." 
"What  did  you  hear?"  queried  Mr.  Reed.  "I  heard," 
answered  I,  "that  after  he  had  prepared  his  tariff  message, 
December,  1887,  he  called  into  counsel  the  Democratic 
leaders  and,  having  read  it  to  them,  invited  their  sug- 
gestions. They  one  and  all  tried  to  dissuade  him  from 
sending  it  to  Congress,  stating  that,  as  the  Senate  was 
Repubhcan,  his  ideas  would  not  be  enacted  into  law; 
that  if  he  did  not  send  it  his  re-election  was  certain,  but 
if  he  did  send  it  in  his  success  would  be  jeopardized.  He 
replied:  "The  message  is  right;  the  people  are  suffering 
from  an  unnecessary  burden  of  taxation;  the  huge  sur- 
plus should  be  reduced.  I  am  determined  to  send  it  to 
Congress  and  let  the  election  take  care  of  itself." 

"That  is  all  a  fairy-tale,"  drawled  Mr.  Reed.  "There 
isn't  a  scintilla  of  truth  in  it."  "What  is  the  truth?" 
I  asked. 

He  said,  "The  truth  is  that  the  incident  about  the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  281 

return  of  the  captured  Confederate  battle-flags,  his 
numerous  vetoes  of  pension  bills  and  other  unwise  actions, 
had  alienated  the  Democrats  of  the  North,  and  he  sent 
that  Free  Trade  message  to  Congress  on  a  cold  collar  as 
a  bid  for  Southern  and  Western  delegates  to  the  nominat- 
ing convention!"  Thus  are  set  forth  two  conflicting 
theories  touching  that  famous  message.  The  reader  can 
take  his  choice.  Subsequent  events  throw  some  Hght 
on  the  two  irreconcilable  theories.  To  the  St.  Louis 
Convention  of  1888,  Senator  Arthur  Pue  Gorman,  of 
Maryland,  who  was  most  decidedly  not  a  tariflp  reformer, 
carried  a  platform  with  a  tariff*  plank  indorsed  by  Presi- 
dent Cleveland,  which  was  a  distinct  retreat  from  the 
December  message,  but  neither  the  committee  on  plat- 
form nor  the  convention  would  accept  it,  and  adopted  a 
tariff"  plank  holding  Mr.  Cleveland  to  the  advanced 
position  taken  in  his  December  message,  capping  it  by 
an  indorsement  of  the  Mills  Tariff*  bill,  considered  a 
radical  measure.  On  that  platform  Mr.  Cleveland  went 
to  defeat. 

When  a  man  hasn't  ingenuity  enough  to  invent  a  witti- 
cism or  bit  of  humor  himself,  and  hasn't  heart  enough  to 
enjoy  it  when  originated  by  others,  he  writes  the  wit  or 
humorist  down  as  a  fool.  That  is  the  dullard's  argu- 
ment against  mental  briUiancy. 

It  would  require  vast  audacity  to  deny  to  Mr.  Reed 
brightness  and  strength  of  mind,  and  yet  there  was  noth- 
ing on  earth  that  he  would  not  jest  about. 

He  did  not  spare  even  his  own  personal  appearance. 
One  evening  he  was  dining  at  a  swell  Washington  restau- 
rant. A  newspaper  correspondent,  desiring  to  see  him 
on  important  business,  peered  into  the  dining-room,  but 
did  not  recognize  him.  The  landlord  went  in  and  brought 
Mr.  Reed  out,  whereupon  the  scribe  said:  "I  saw  you 
in  there,  but  mistook  you  for  President  Cleveland." 
Reed,  solemn  as  an  owl,  replied:    "For  Heaven's  sake, 


282   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

never  let  Grover  know  that;  he  is  too  vain  of  his  beauty 
now!" 

The  qualities  which  gave  Reed  his  immense  power  in 
the  House  were  his  readiness  at  repartee  and  his  biting 
sarcasm. 

Tom  Marshall  described  old  Ben  Hardin  as  a  butcher- 
knife  whetted  on  a  brickbat. 

Reed  was  a  sort  of  combination  rasp,  Damascus  blade, 
and  bludgeon.  Metaphorically  speaking,  sometimes  he 
rubbed  the  skin  off,  sometimes  he  cut  to  the  bone,  and 
sometimes  he  crushed  in  a  skull  as  though  it  were  an  egg- 
shell. 

One  day  he  was  making  a  speech  and,  as  usual,  flaying 
the  Democrats,  when  a  handsome  and  highly  respectable 
member  of  six  years*  service  in  Congress,  without  rising 
from  his  seat,  jogged  his  memory  about  something  he 
did  when  Speaker.  Reed  paused  long  enough  to  attract 
the  attention  of  everybody,  and  then,  with  his  most 
exasperating  nasal  twang,  said:  "Yesterday  I  had  a  dis- 
cussion with  Mr.  Wilson,  the  head  of  the  House  Demo- 
crats, and  to-day,  however  unpleasant  it  may  be,  I  sup- 
pose I  will  be  compelled  to  have  a  discussion  with  the 
tail  of  the  Democratic  party." 

Of  course  the  House  roared.  It  couldn't  help  itself. 
Such  a  shot  at  point-blank  range  would  place  any  man 
in  Christendom  hors  de  combat — temporarily  at  least. 

On  another  occasion,  while  in  the  full  tide  of  eloquence, 
Mr.  Reed  was  interrupted  by  the  redoubtable  Amos 
Cummings,  of  New  York.  Reed  looked  at  him  in  a 
fatherly  sort  of  way  for  a  moment,  and  then,  with  mock 
pathos,  asked:  "Now,  Amos,  must  you,  must  you  really 
get  your  name  into  my  speech — must  you  ? "  The  theatri- 
cal pose  and  injured  expression  set  the  House  in  a  broad 
grin,  at  the  expense  of  the  bravest  of  the  Tammany 
braves. 

During  the  discussion  of  the  Carlisle  bill  John  DeWitt 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  283 

Warner  made  a  furious  onslaught  upon  the  RepubHcans 
in  general  and  Reed  in  particular.  Reed  began  his  an- 
swer by  saying,  in  a  sneering  tone:  "I  cannot  hope  to 
equal  the  volume  of  voice  of  the  gentleman  from  New 
York.  That  is  only  equaled  by  the  volume  of  what  he 
does  not  know." 

When  Senator  Wolcott,  of  Colorado,  in  his  fracas  with 
Carey  of  Wyoming,  dramatically  exclaimed,  "It  is  waste 
of  lather  to  shave  an  ass,"  it  set  people  to  disputing  what 
was  the  most  caustic  thing  ever  said  by  one  Congressman 
of  another.  The  pundits  were  divided  in  opinion  be- 
tween Wolcott's  jab  at  Carey  and  Reed's  characteriza- 
tion of  John  A.  Pickler,  of  South  Dakota.  When  Reed 
first  saw  Pickler  perform,  so  the  story  goes,  he  said,  not 
on  the  floor  of  the  House,  as  commonly  reported,  but  in 
private,  to  a  personal  friend:  **I  have  read  and  heard 
much  of  the  wild  ass's  colt  of  the  desert,  but  I  never  had 
any  clear  conception  of  what  manner  of  animal  it  really 
was  till  I  saw  Pickler  in  action." 

The  chances  are  that  if  Pickler  had  remained  in  Con- 
gress a  hundred  years,  every  time  he  began  prancing 
around  some  old  member  would  tell  that  story  to  a  new 
one,  and  thus  it  would  descend  from  generation  to  gen- 
eration as  a  part  of  the  unwritten  history  of  the  House. 

One  day  when  a  discussion  on  pensions  was  dragging 
its  slow  length  along,  Mr.  Reed,  who  was  the  very  pict- 
ure of  health,  amused  a  coterie  of  friends  in  the  cloak- 
room by  giving  a  reason  why  he  should  have  a  pension. 
It  ran  something  as  follows:  "I  had  never  been  able  to 
make  more  than  five  hundred  dollars  or  six  hundred  dol- 
lars a  year,"  said  he,  with  a  chuckle,  "till  I  was  appointed 
acting  Assistant  Paymaster  of  the  United  States  Navy 
at  a  salary  of  fourteen  hundred  dollars,  with  board,  lodg- 
ings, uniform,  and  two  servants  to  wait  on  me.  That 
induced  an  extravagant  style  of  living  which  I  have  kept 
up  ever  since  and  which  has  cost  me  thousands  and  thou- 


284   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

sands  of  dollars — for  which  the  government  ought,  in 
good  conscience,  to  compensate  me." 

There  was  no  love  lost  between  Reed  and  President 
Benjamin  Harrison.  They  spoke  as  they  passed  by, 
but  that's  about  all  the  communication  they  held  with 
each  other.  It  was  utterly  impossible  that  there  should 
be  any  kindred  feeling  between  two  such  men.  Harrison 
was  cold  as  "Greenland's  icy  mountains,"  always  on  his 
p's  and  q's,  and  plumed  himself  immensely  on  his  blue 
blood.  Reed  was  hot-blooded  for  a  New-Englander, 
careless  of  the  minor  details  of  ceremonials,  a  self-made 
man  who  worshiped  his  Maker. 

Along  in  the  sultry  days  of  August,  1894,  when  any 
tariff  legislation  seemed  hopeless  and  when  the  Demo- 
cratic party  resembled  a  dissolving  view  more  than  any- 
thing else.  Reed  came  to  where  several  free-traders  were 
sitting,  and  began  chaffing  them  unmercifully  about  the 
condition  of  affairs.  After  a  while  some  one  said:  "Mr. 
Reed,  how  do  you  like  the  last  Republican  presidential 
ticket  gotten  up  by  the  newspapers?"  He  lazily  asked, 
"What  is  it?"  His  friend  replied,  "Bob  Lincoln  and 
Fred  Grant."  "Oh,  the  deuce!"  he  blurted  out.  "If  they 
would  only  add  Baby  McKee  to  it,  the  thing  would  be 
perfect,"  and  away  he  went,  Hke  a  great  three-decker  in 
a  surging  sea. 

In  the  greenback  year  in  Maine  he  escaped  defeat  by 
only  one  hundred  and  fifteen  majority.  When  he  went 
to  supper  he  thought  he  was  defeated.  When  he  returned 
to  headquarters  after  supper  his  followers  set  up  a  mighty 
shout.  Not  having  heard  of  his  election,  he  said  to  them, 
"You  are  making  a  tremendous  fuss  over  the  corpse." 
In  relating  that  incident  in  his  Hfe,  he  naively  remarked: 
**The  country  came  near  losing  the  invaluable  services  of 
a  great  statesman  on  that  occasion." 

The  first  speech  he  made  in  the  House  he  killed  a  mem- 
ber, who  was  a  great  humbug,  dead  as  a  smelt,  in  this 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  285 

wise:  There  was  an  old  chap  from  one  of  the  Central 
Western  states  who  possessed  a  double  ambition — he 
wanted  to  make  his  constituents  beheve  that  he  was 
always  in  the  House  attending  to  his  duties,  while  at  the 
same  time  he  desired  to  enjoy  the  gaieties  and  frivolities  of 
the  finest  capital  in  the  world.  So  he  hit  on  this  some- 
what ingenious  scheme  of  kilHng  two  birds  with  one  stone. 
When  a  member  arose  to  dehver  the  first  remarks  of  the  day 
that  old  man  would  prance  down  the  big  aisle,  rise  to  a 
question  of  information,  and  ask  the  Speaker  what  bill  or 
resolution  was  up.  The  Speaker  would  tell  him,  which 
got  his  name  in  The  Congressional  Record  for  that  day. 
Then  away  he  would  go,  and  nobody  would  see  him  again 
until  the  next  day;  but  if  anybody  denied  he  was  present 
he  could  prove  it  by  the  record.  He  carried  his  pitcher 
to  the  fountain,  however,  once  too  often.  Of  all  created 
things,  Reed  hated  a  hypocrite  most.  Nothing  gave  him 
more  exquisite  pleasure  than  to  unmask  and  fricassee  one. 
So  when  he  began  his  first  speech,  the  old  pretender  arose 
and  asked  the  Speaker  what  was  up,  as  usual.  Reed  did 
not  wait  for  the  Speaker  to  answer,  but  answered  himself, 
and  then  said:  "Now,  Mr.  Speaker,  having  embedded 
that  fly  in  the  liquid  amber  of  my  eloquence,  I  will  pro- 
ceed with  my  remarks!"  amid  such  a  shout  of  laughter 
as  to  endanger  the  glass  roof.  Next  year  when  there 
was  a  Congressional  nominating  convention  in  that  old 
fellow's  district,  some  hayseed  delegate  climbed  on  to  a 
bench  and  bellowed:  "Mr.  Cheerman,  we  don't  want 
to  send  any  man  to  Congress  who  has  been  embedded  in 
Tom  Reed's  ambeerl"  which  was  the  end  of  our  ancient 
and  ingenious  friend  from  the  Central  West. 

He  was  a  skilful  and  fertile  maker  of  epigrams  and 
mots.  One  of  the  most  celebrated  is  this:  "A  statesman 
is  a  successful  politician  who  is  dead" — in  answer  to  a 
letter  asking  him  to  define  a  "statesman."  In  his  fine 
essay  on  Reed,  Senator  Henry  Cabot  Lodge  says:  "The 


286   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

epigram  was  published,  flew  over  the  country,  and  has 
become  a  famihar  quotation.  But  the  sequel  is  less  well 
known.  The  correspondent  who  asked  the  question  tele- 
graphed as  soon  as  he  received  the  answer,  "Why  don't 
you  die  and  become  a  statesman?"  Mr.  Reed  handed 
me  the  telegram  and  said:  "Here  is  my  answer:  No. 
Fame  is  the  last  infirmity  of  noble  minds!" 

Senator  Lodge  also  says:  "In  1884  I  recall  coming 
across  him  in  State  Street  just  after  the  nomination  of 
Mr.  Blaine.  The  break  in  the  Republican  party  had 
begun  and  I  asked  Mr.  Reed  what  he  thought  of  the  out- 
look. *Well,'  he  said,  *it  is  a  great  comfort  to  think 
that  the  wicked  politicians  were  not  allowed  to  pick  the 
candidate  and  that  the  nomination  was  made  by  the 
people.  The  politicians  would  have  been  guided  only  by 
a  base  desire  to  win!" 

The  Senator  also  records  these  two  mots:  When  they 
were  drawing  seats,  the  Senator  suggested  that  it  was 
evident  they  would  get  poor  seats.  "Yes,"  said  Reed, 
"the  great  trouble  with  this  system  is  that  it  is  so  dia- 
bolically fair!" 

The  Senator  records  that  on  another  occasion  Mr.  Reed 
said,  with  reference  to  election  cases:  "The  House  never 
divides  on  strictly  partizan  lines  except  when  acting 
judicially." 

According  to  my  way  of  thinking,  one  of  his  most 
exquisite  epigrams  was  this:  "All  the  wisdom  of  the 
world  consists  of  shouting  with  the  majority,"  and  it  was 
one  of  his  most  sarcastic. 

One  of  his  mots,  familiar  to  the  ears  of  men,  is  his 
sarcastic  fling  at  WiUiam  M.  Springer,  Democrat,  of 
Illinois,  of  twenty  years*  service  in  the  House,  who  rose 
to  be  chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Ways  and  Means, 
was  a  candidate  for  Speaker  in  1891,  and  finally  became 
a  judge  in  the  Indian  Territory  by  appointment  of  Presi- 
dent Cleveland  for  his  position  on  the  repeal  of  th^ 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  287 

purchasing  clause  of  the  Sherman  Silver  Law.  Springer's 
conduct  in  that  affair  defeated  him  for  re-election  to  the 
House,  but  gained  him  the  judgeship.  So  he  played  even 
— faring  much  better  than  most  of  "the  lame  ducks." 
What  a  brood  of  them  Mr.  Cleveland  had  on  hand! 
The  slaughter  of  the  innocents  at  the  election  of  1894 
has  never  been  equaled  since  the  days  of  King  Herod. 

Springer  was  an  indefatigable  worker  and  a  frequent 
speaker,  talking  on  every  subject  and  filling  thousands 
of  pages  of  The  Congressional  Record  with  his  remarks. 
His  speeches  were  crammed  with  useful  and  varied  infor- 
mation, but  after  all  were  simply  raw  material  handy 
for  more  skilful  word  artists. 

When  I  was  teaching  school  at  Louisiana,  Missouri, 
one  of  my  co-teachers  was  a  bright  old  lady  named  Mrs. 
Hoss.  One  day  I  told  her  that  a  certain  man  in  town 
carried  in  his  mind  an  amazing  number  of  facts.  "Yes," 
she  replied,  "but  what  he  needs  most  is  a  bolting-chest  to 
his  head" — "bolting-chest"  being  part  of  an  old-time 
milling  apparatus  with  which  I  fear  my  younger  readers 
will  not  be  familiar.  I  never  heard  Mr.  Springer  speak 
that  I  did  not  think  of  Mrs.  Hoss  and  her  bolting-chest. 

Reed  did  not  have  a  high  opinion  of  Springer's  ability 
and  took  a  malicious  pleasure  in  worrying  him.  As 
Springer  possessed  no  mental  agiHty,  Reed  considered 
him  easy  game.  One  day  they  had  a  tilt,  which  ended 
this  way.  Springer  exclaimed:  "Fm  right.  I  know  I'm 
right,  and  I  say  with  Henry  Clay,  Fd  rather  be  right  than 
President!"  "But,"  drawled  Reed,  "the  trouble  with 
you  is,  you  will  never  be  either!" 

On  another  occasion  Springer  complained  that  Reed 
was  "making  light"  of  his  argument.  Reed  said,  "If  I 
am  making  light  of  your  argument  it  is  more  than  you 
have  ever  been  able  to  do  with  any  of  your  arguments!" 

I  can  never  forget  a  brief  conversation  I  had  with  Mr. 
Reed,  or  more,  properly  speaking,  which  he  had  with  me. 


288   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

as  he  began  it,  about  the  Democrats  adopting  a  quorum- 
counting  rule.  It  will  be  remembered  that  the  Demo- 
cratic caucus  which  adopted  it  lasted  two  nights.  On 
the  day  between  those  two  nights  Mr.  Reed  came  by  my 
desk  and  asked,  **  Clark,  what  are  the  Democrats  going 
to  do  to-night?"  I  promptly  repHed,  "Adopt  a  quo- 
rum-counting rule!" — ^which  appeared  to  amuse  him 
very  much.  He  said,  "Young  man,  you  are  egregiously 
mistaken;  the  old  members  who  fought  me  so  fiercely 
in  the  Fifty-first  Congress  will  take  you  new  members 
up  and  shake  you  like  a  bull-terrier  would  shake  a  rat." 
I  answered,  "You  stay  up  till  midnight  and  you  will  hear 
the  news  that  we  won."  I  missed  the  time  required  by 
two  or  three  hours,  for  that  caucus  lasted  till  the  wee, 
sma'  hours  of  the  morning,  but  we  did  adopt  the  quorum- 
counting  rule. 

It  is  a  matter  of  common  knowledge  that  Reed  hated 
President  McKinley  intensely.  In  1891  they  were  the 
leading  candidates  for  the  nomination  for  Speaker.  Reed 
could  never  forgive  himself  for  making  McKinley  chair- 
man of  che  Ways  and  Means  Committee,  thereby  giving 
him  the  opportunity  of  being  the  Daddy  of  "the  McKin- 
ley bill,"  which  at  first  wrought  such  havoc  among 
Republicans,  even  defeating  its  author,  but  which  sub- 
sequently more  than  any  other  cause  elevated  him  to 
the  Presidency.  Reed  deemed  himself  McKinley's  supe-. 
rior  and  took  a  crack  at  him  whenever  he  got  a  chance. 

It  may  not  be  known  to  many,  and  the  fact  is  not  im- 
portant when  known,  but  it  is  nevertheless  interesting 
that  for  years  the  chaplains  of  both  House  and  Senate 
were  blind  as  bats.  I  often  wondered  if  it  was  another 
case  of  the  blind  leading  the  blind  and  all  tumbling  into 
the  ditch  together.  We  get  there  often  enough,  snyway. 
The  blind  chaplain  of  the  House  knows  enough  to  pray 
short  prayers.  He  understands  the  spiritual  tastes  if 
not  the  spiritual  needs  of  his  flock.     Once  in  a  while. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  289 

however,  a  visiting  brother  drops  in  who  goes  into  things 
more  in  extenso.  So,  one  morning  just  after  the  begin- 
ning of  our  war  with  Spain,  a  young  army  chaplain 
opened  the  House  proceedings  with  prayer.  He  prayed 
about  everything  from  the  fall  of  Adam  to  the  blowing 
up  of  the  Maine y  winding  up  with  these  fervent  ejacula- 
tions: "O  Lord!  Give  the  House  wisdom!  O  Lord!  Give 
the  Senate  wisdom!!  But  especially,  O  Lord!  Give  the 
President  wisdom!!!" 

Knowing  Reed's  feeling  toward  McKinley,  I  sauntered 
up  to  the  Speaker's  stand,  and  inquired  of  him  privately 
if  he  would  recognize  me  to  ask  unanimous  consent  to 
insert  the  young  chaplain's  prayer  in  The  Congressional 
Record.  "No,"  he  replied,  "I  will  not  do  that,  but  it 
seems  to  me  that  the  young  man's  petition  to  the  Lord  to 
endow  Mack  with  wisdom  was  the  most  appropriate 
prayer  I  ever  heard." 

On  another  occasion  a  visiting  brother  closed  his  prayer 
with  the  request  that  the  Lord  cause  Speaker  Reed  to 
rule  the  House  according  to  the  will  of  God.  An  irrever- 
ent member  standing  close  to  me  remarked,  sotto  voce, 
that  that  was  the  most  preposterous  petition  ever  pre- 
ferred to  the  throne  of  grace. 

When  the  war  with  Spain  was  brewing,  it  was  openly 
and  frequently  charged  in  the  newspapers,  in  private 
conversation,  and  in  public  speech,  that  President  Mc- 
Kinley wabbled  a  good  deal  on  the  subject.  Many 
Senators  and  Representatives  believed  it.  While  the 
talk  about  his  wabbling  was  flagrant,  one  morning  a 
bunch  of  us  were  discussing  the  matter  in  the  Speaker's 
lobby  when  Mr.  Speaker  Reed  strolled  in.  He  listened 
to  the  conversation  a  moment  and  said:  "In  my  capacity 
as  a  Representative  I  intend  to  introduce  a  bill  appro- 
priating an  adequate  sum  of  money  to  have  a  mammoth 
picture  of  war  painted  on  a  wall  of  the  Capitol— cannons 
belching  forth  fire  and  death,  infantry  and  cavalry  charg- 

VoL.  I.— 19 


290   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

ing,  men  falling  on  every  hand,  and  in  the  midst  thereof 
William  McKinley  standing  firm!'* 

Reed  and  Colonel  Roosevelt  were  close  friends.  Some- 
body asked  the  former  why  he  was  so  fond  of  the  latter. 
"Because,"  replied  Reed,  "Theodore  is  so  certain  that 
he  discovered  the  Ten  Commandments!'' 

Gov.  Samuel  Walker  McCall,  who  served  twenty  years 
in  the  House,  half  of  them  with  Reed,  of  whom  he  was 
very  fond,  has  written  a  very  readable  life  of  him.  He 
gives  these  two  evidences  of  Reed's  dislike  for  President 
Harrison.  On  one  occasion  Reed  said:  "I  had  but  two 
enemies  in  Maine;  one  of  them  Harrison  pardoned  out 
of  the  penitentiary,  and  the  other  he  appointed  Collector 
of  Portland." 

Just  after  Blaine  resigned  the  Secretaryship  of  State 
in  1892,  Reed,  writing  to  Charles  Fairchild,  of  Boston, 
said: 

"Blaine  is  out  and  we  are  face  to  face  with  a  Siberian 
solitude.  I  don't  know  what  will  happen,  but  I  beg  to 
say  to  you,  as  an  influential  Massachusetts  man,  that 
if  any  ice-chest  is  to  hold  our  fortunes  you  must  not  ask 
me  to  come  to  Massachusetts  during  the  campaign  if 
you  send  a  delegation  which  is  for  the  said  ice-chest. 
Don't  forget  this  and  find  fault  with  me.  I  have  spent 
my  life  taking  political  pills,  but  my  powers  of  deglutition 
are,  after  all,  limited.  B.  Harrison  would  be  dead  to 
start  with." 

Among  the  samples  of  Reed's  wit,  humor,  and  sarcasm 
which  the  Governor  gives  are  these: 

Once  the  House  was  making  an  effort  to  secure  a 
quorum,  and,  as  is  usually  done  in  such  cases,  telegrams 
were  sent  to  members  who  were  absent.  One  man,  who 
was  delayed  by  a  flood  on  the  railroad,  telegraphed  Reed, 
saying,  "Washout  on  Hne.  Can't  come."  Reed  tele- 
graphed back,  "Buy  another  shirt  and  come  on  next 
train." 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  291 

He  called  on  the  family  of  a  member  who  was  very  ill, 
and  when  he  inquired  about  his  condition  the  member*s 
wife  replied  that  he  was  out  of  his  head  much  of  the  time 
and  did  not  know  what  he  was  talking  about.  "He  ought 
to  come  up  to  the  House,"  replied  Reed.  "They  are  all 
that  way  up  there." 

When  Reed  was  Speaker  he  overruled  on  an  occasion 
a  point  of  order  made  by  a  very  clever  Democratic 
member.  The  latter  discovered  that  Reed,  in  his  little 
book  on  parliamentary  procedure,  called  Reed's  Rules, 
had  taken  a  different  position,  and,  thinking  to  confound 
the  Speaker,  he  walked  in  triumph  to  the  desk,  book  in 
hand,  and  pointing  to  the  passage,  asked  the  Speaker  to 
read  it.  After  the  Speaker  had  read  it  the  member  asked 
him  to  explain  it.  "Oh,"  replied  Reed,  coolly,  "the  book 
is  wrong." 

He  was  bitterly  opposed  to  our  war  with  the  Philip- 
pines, and  he  expressed  his  idea  of  the  glory  of  the  war  in 
a  concrete  case  in  the  following  fashion.  One  morning, 
when  the  newspapers  had  printed  a  report  that  our  army 
had  captured  Aguinaldo*s  young  son.  Reed  came  to  his 
office  and  found  his  law  partner  at  work  at  his  desk. 
Reed  affected  surprise  and  said:  "What,  are  you  working 
to-day?  I  should  think  you  would  be  celebrating.  I 
see  by  the  papers  that  the  American  Army  has  captured 
the  infant  son  of  Aguinaldo  and  at  last  accounts  was  in 
hot  pursuit  of  the  mother." 

He  once  heard  a  man  warmly  arguing  in  favor  of  taking 
the  PhiHppines  on  the  ground  that  we  should  take  Ameri- 
can freedom  to  them.  "Yes,"  said  Reed,  "canned 
freedom." 

Alluding  to  two  of  his  colleagues  m  the  House,  he  said  : 
"They  never  open  their  mouths  without  subtracting 
from  the  sum  of  human  knowledge." 

When  his  daughter  Katherine,  or  "Kitty,"  as  he  called 
^her,  was  a  little  girl,  she  had  a  cat  to  which  she  was  muqh 


292   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

devoted.  One  day  the  kitten  was  sleeping  in  Reed's 
chair  when  he  was  about  to  sit  down.  His  daughter,  in 
horror,  gave  the  chair  a  sudden  pull  to  save  the  cat  from 
annihilation,  and  as  a  result  Reed  sat  down  heavily  on 
the  floor.  It  was  a  rather  serious  happening  for  a  man 
of  his  size,  and  even  a  lesser  man  might  easily  have  lost 
his  temper.  But  the  only  notice  he  took  of  the  matter 
was  to  say,  gravely,  after  he  had  got  on  his  feet,  "Kitty, 
remember  that  it  is  easier  to  get  another  cat  than  another 
father." 

Once  when  he  was  speaking  to  the  House  a  member 
insisted  on  interrupting  him  to  ask  a  question.  Reed 
yielded,  and  the  member  asked  a  partizan  question  which 
had  very  little  point.  Reed  most  effectively  disposed  of 
the  matter  by  saying,  "The  gentleman  from  Maryland 
is,  of  course,  not  the  flower  of  our  intelligence,  but  he 
knows  better  than  to  ask  such  a  question  as  that.'* 

During  one  of  his  campaigns  he  was  speaking  at  South 
Berwick  in  his  district,  and  he  was  near  the  end  of  his 
speech.  The  audience  was  hanging  on  the  words  of  his 
peroration  when  a  man  came  down  in  his  seat  with  a 
crash.  Such  an  incident  would  often  disconcert  a  speaker 
and  the  "last  magnificent  paragraph"  would  be  spoken 
with  little  effect,  if  spoken  at  all.  Reed  at  once  secured 
again  the  command  of  his  audience  by  saying,  "Well, 
you  must  at  least  credit  me  with  making  a  knockdown 
argument." 

Very  much  used  to  be  said  about  Washington  malaria, 
and  one  day  some  one  suggested  to  Reed  that  the  term 
was  employed  often  to  cover  the  effects  of  drinking  too 
much  whisky.  "Washington  malaria,"  replied  Reed, 
"can  be  bought  for  two  dollars  a  gallon." 

The  Governor  gives,  as  a  specimen  of  Reed's  speech- 
making,  his  closing  remarks  on  the  repeal  of  the  pur- 
chasing clause  in  the  Sherman  Silver  Law.  Reed  said 
that  the  charge  that  silver  had  been  stealthily  demone-. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  293 

tized  had  been  answered  so  often  that  he  would  not 
burden  his  speech  with  the  proofs,  and  then  proceeded 
in  this  wise: 

"I  shall  simply  content  myself  with  saying  that  there 
never  was  a  more  open,  straightforward  discussion  since 
the  beginning  of  time  than  that  by  which  silver  was  de- 
monetized. .  .  .  What,  then,  is  the  pathway  of  duty? 
The  unconditional  repeal.  That  will  either  give  relief  or 
not.  If  not,  then  we  must  try  something  else,  and  the 
sooner  the  better.  ...  It  is  such  a  pity  that  we  had  to 
waste  so  much  time  in  this  weary  welter  of  talk. 

"We  stand  in  a  very  pecuhar  position,  we  Repubhcans, 
to-day.  The  representative  of  the  Democratic  party 
just  chosen  President  of  the  United  States  finds  himself 
powerless  in  his  first  great  recommendation  to  his  own 
party.  Were  he  left  to  their  tender  mercies  the  country 
would  witness  the  spectacle  of  the  President  of  its  choice 
overthrown  by  the  party  charged  with  this  country's 
government.  What  wonder,  then,  that  he  appeals  to  the 
patriotism  of  another  party  whose  patriotism  has  never 
been  appealed  to  in  vain.  Never,  I  say,  in  vain.  The 
proudest  part  of  the  proud  record  of  the  Republican  party 
has  been  its  steadfast  devotion  to  the  cause  of  sound 
finance.  When  this  country  was  tempted  to  pay  its 
bonds  in  depreciated  money,  the  Republican  party  re- 
sponded with  loud  acclaim  to  that  noble  sentiment  of 
General  Hawley  that  every  bond  was  as  sacred  as  a 
soldier's  grave.  It  cost  us  hard  fighting  and  sore  struggle, 
but  the  credit  of  this  country  has  no  superior  in  the 
world.  When  the  same  arguments  heard  to-day  were 
heard  fifteen  years  ago,  sounding  the  praises  of  a  depre- 
ciated currency,  and  proclaiming  the  glories  of  fiat  money, 
the  party  of  Abraham  Lincoln  marched  steadily  toward 
specie  payments  and  prosperity.  What  we  were  in  our 
days  of  victory  the  same  are  we  in  our  days  of  defeat. 
Champions  of  true  and  solid  finance.     And  when  the  time 


294   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

comes,  as  it  surely  will  come,  for  us  to  lead  this  land  back 
to  those  paths  of  prosperity  and  fame  which  were  trodden 
under  Republican  rule  for  so  many  years,  we  shall  take 
back  with  us  our  ancient  glory,  undimmed  by  adversity, 
our  ancient  honor  unsullied  by  defeat." 

That  he  was  a  constant  thorn  in  the  side  of  the  Demo- 
crats is  known  to  all  the  world.  That  he  was  absolute 
master  on  the  Republican  side  is  not  a  matter  of  so  much 
notoriety. 

As  to  the  Republican  contingent  in  the  House,  he  was 
a  "Triton  among  the  minnows — a  giant  among  pygmies." 
No  company  of  soldiers  in  the  regular  army  was  ever 
more  thoroughly  drilled  than  was  the  Republican  minority 
of  the  Fifty-third  Congress.  There  is  a  famiHar  old  dic- 
tum: "When  Simon  says  thumbs  up  it  is  thumbs  up, 
and  when  Simon  says  thumbs  down  it  is  thumbs  down." 
Time  and  again  I  have  seen  Mr.  Reed  bring  every  Re- 
publican up  standing  by  waving  his  hands  upward;  and 
just  as  often,  when  they  had  risen  inadvertently,  I  have 
seen  him  make  them  take  their  seats  by  waving  his 
hands  downward. 

I  once  heard  a  minister  preach  who  knew  a  great  deal 
more  about  theology  than  about  English  grammar.  He 
read  a  verse  from  the  Bible,  and  then  said:  "Brethren 
and  sisters,  the  whole  of  the  Gospel  is  all  squz  up  in  that 
one  little  text."  Mr.  Reed's  career  in  the  Fifty-third 
Congress  was  "all  squz  up"  in  one  remark  made  by  Lafe 
Pence,  the  brilliant  young  Populist  from  Colorado,  when 
he  characterized  him  as  "the  mentor  of  the  Republicans 
and  the  tormentor  of  the  Democrats." 

In  private  Mr.  Reed  was  affable  and  jolly.  When  I 
was  introduced  to  him,  for  loss  of  something  better  to 
say,  I  remarked:  "Mr.  Reed,  I  have  frequently  mentioned 
you  in  my  stump  speeches."  "Yes,  no  doubt,"  he 
drawled,  while  he  regarded  me  quizzically  out  of  the  cor- 
ner of  his  eye,  "but  how.f*"     I  wondered  if  he  had  read 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  295 

a  certain  stump  speech  wherein  I  had  characterized  him 
as  "the  moon-faced  despot  from  Maine.'* 

When  Col.  Bob  White  was  in  Washington  I  took 
several  "big  guns"  out  in  the  corridor  to  introduce  them. 
I  told  Mr.  Reed  that  I  had  a  Democratic  editor  out  there 
whom  I  wished  him  to  meet.  Looking  at  me  intently, 
while  a  smile  played  over  his  countenance,  he  said,  **Will 
you  vouch  for  his  good,  moral  character  as  a  Democrat?" 
I  vouched,  and  Bob  enjoyed  a  short  dialogue  with  the 
gentleman  from  Maine. 

His  fame  rests  on  his  quorum-counting  rule  and  upon 
his  wit,  humor,  and  sarcasm,  samples  of  which  I  have 
given,  and  hundreds  more  which  I  could  give. 

Jonathan  Prentice  Dolliver,  of  Iowa,  an  eloquent  and 
brilliant  member  of  the  House,  and  afterward  of  the 
Senate,  a  bosom  friend  and  enthusiastic  admirer  of  Reed, 
once  told  him  that  if  he  had  spent  his  many  years  in  the 
House  in  formulating  and  placing  upon  the  statute-books 
some  great  measure  for  the  country's  good,  instead  of 
making  sarcastic  epigrams  about  people  he  disliked,  he 
would  have  been  President!     Who  knows? 

He  was  opposed  to  the  annexation  of  the  Hawaiian 
Islands;  he  was  opposed  to  our  war  with  Spain;  and  he 
was  so  thoroughly  opposed  to  our  policy  touching  the 
Philippines  that  his  conscience  would  not  permit  him  to 
remain  in  public  life — which  he  so  much  adorned.  So 
he  resigned  to  practise  law  in  New  York,  and  in  the  few 
years  remaining  to  him  amassed  an  ample  competency, 
but  which  he  did  not  live  long  to  enjoy. 


CHAPTER  XI 

The  Speakership. 

THE  title  of  "Speaker"  is  a  palpable  misnomer,  if  the 
word  is  to  be  used  in  the  ordinary  sense;  for,  most 
emphatically,  it  is  not  his  chief  duty  to  make  speeches, 
but  to  maintain  order  and  decorum;  to  conduct  the  busi- 
ness of  the  House,  and  in  a  general  way  to  supervise 
things  in  that  large  and  tumultuous  assembly.  He  is  ex- 
pected to  deliver  a  short  inaugural  address,  and  a  short 
speech  at  the  close  of  each  session,  the  only  speechmaking 
which  custom  makes  binding  on  him.  Occasion  may 
arise  where  a  speech  from  the  Speaker's  stand  is  not 
inapropos. 

For  instance,  a  few  days  after  I  was  inducted  into 
office,  my  colleague,  Hon.  James  T.  Lloyd,  arose  in  his 
place  and  on  behalf  of  my  Ralls  County  constituents 
presented  me  with  a  handsome  bur-oak  gavel,  silver 
mounted,  properly  inscribed,  and  made  from  the  "apron- 
log"  of  the  first  mill-dam  built  north  of  the  Missouri 
River,  the  building  of  which  was  an  important  local  his- 
toric event.  Coupled  with  that  was  another  important 
fact,  important  not  to  Missouri  alone,  but  to  the  whole 
country,  and  that  was  that  on  his  death-bed  Daniel  Ralls, 
for  whom  Rails  County  was  named,  cast  the  decisive 
ballot  which  started  Col.  Thomas  Hart  Benton  on  his 
high  career  of  thirty  consecutive  years  in  the  Senate  of 
the  United  States.  It  being  an  interesting  occasion,  to 
Missourians,  at  any  rate,  I  delivered  a  brief  speech  of 
acceptance. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  297 

Again,  when  the  venerable  Sydenham  E.  Ancona,  of 
Reading,  Pennsylvania,  the  only  survivor  of  that  famous 
Congress  which  met  in  extraordinary  session,  July  4, 
1861,  recently  came  upon  the  floor  of  the  House,  I  halted 
the  proceedings,  without  any  rule  authorizing  me  so  to 
do,  announced  his  presence  in  a  few  sentences,  and  asked 
his  Representative,  Hon.  John  H.  Rothermel,  to  ask 
unanimous  consent  for  a  recess  for  fifteen  minutes  that 
the  members  might  be  introduced  to  the  veteran  states- 
man. He  enjoyed  the  impromptu  reception,  as  did  the 
members.  But  speeches  by  the  Speaker  from  the  chair 
are  rare  indeed,  opinions  on  points  of  order,  no  matter 
how  elaborate,  not  being  rated  as  speeches. 

Of  course  the  Speaker  has  the  same  right  as  any  other 
member  to  speak  from  the  floor.  In  the  earlier  days 
it  seems  to  have  been  the  rule  rather  than  the  excep- 
tion. It  was  Henry  Clay's  habit  to  participate  in  de- 
bate whenever  the  spirit  moved  him,  which  was  quite 
frequently.  The  custom,  however,  has  fallen  largely  into 
"innocuous  desuetude,"  to  borrow  Mr.  Cleveland's  fa- 
mous phrase. 

During  the  Fifty-third  Congress,  the  first  in  which  I 
served,  Mr.  Speaker  Crisp  spoke  from  the  floor  only 
once.  That  was  on  the  Wilson  TariflF  bill.  Neither  Mr. 
Speaker  Reed  nor  Mr.  Speaker  Henderson  participated 
in  debate,  and  Mr.  Speaker  Cannon  did  so  only  a  few 
times.  On  several  occasions  he  delivered  eulogies  on  de- 
ceased members,  a  species  of  speechmaking  in  which  he 
is  exceedingly  felicitous.  I  spoke  only  a  few  times  from 
the  floor  during  my  eight  years  as  Speaker. 

It  being  a  most  insignificant  portion  of  the  duties  of 
the  presiding  officer  of  the  House  of  Representatives  to 
make  speeches,  how  came  he  by  the  misfit  title  of 
"Speaker'*?  Here  is  the  reason:  The  presiding  oflRcer  of 
the  House  of  Commons  is  called  "Speaker"  because 
originally  he  spoke  for  the  House  to  the  King  and  the 


298   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Lords  on  ceremonial  occasions.  We  simply  borrowed  the 
title  from  the  English  without  rhyme  or  reason. 

At  the  end  of  President  Wilson's  present  term — ^which 
we  all  hope  he  will  live  to  see — the  government  will  have 
existed  132  years  under  the  Constitution;  and  assuming 
that  President  Wilson  will  live  to  fill  out  his  term,  the 
average  presidential  service  will  be  4  8/9  years,  ranging 
from  Gen.  WilHam  Henry  Harrison's  30  days  to  the  two 
full  terms  of  Washington,  Jefferson,  Madison,  Monroe, 
Jackson,  Grant,  Cleveland,  and  Wilson.  During  the  130 
years  ending  March  4,  1919,  there  have  been  36  regularly 
elected  Speakers,  counting  Theodore  M.  Pomeroy,  of 
New  York,  who  was  elected  for  one  day. 

His  election  came  about  in  this  way.  On  March  3, 
1869,  Mr.  Speaker  Colfax  resigned.  So  far  as  I  have 
been  able  to  ascertain,  no  sufficient  reason  was  ever  given 
for  his  action.  He  gave  none  in  his  elaborate  speech  of 
resignation.  The  fact  that  he  was  to  be  sworn  in,  March 
4th,  as  Vice-President  does  not  satisfy  the  inquiring 
mind.  However  that  may  be,  he  did  resign,  and  Mr. 
Pomeroy  was  elected.  Of  course  many  men  have  been 
elected  Speaker  pro  tempore,  and  the  Speaker  sometimes 
designates  some  member  to  act  as  Speaker  for  one  day 
without  the  consent  of  the  House,  or  for  ten  days  with 
the  consent  of  the  House,  provided  the  Speaker  is  sick. 
He  can  do  this  in  one  of  two  ways:  First,  by  announcing 
the  designation  in  open  House;  second,  by  a  letter  to  the 
clerk  of  the  House. 

Excluding  Mr.  Pomeroy  and  Mr.  Speaker  Frederick  Gil- 
lett,  the  average  service  of  the  remaining  35  is  3  25/3  5  years. 

Henry  Clay  was  elected  six  times,  resigned  twice,  and 
served  ten  years  and  two  hundred  and  forty-five  days. 
Clay  resigned  the  first  time  to  go  as  Peace  Commissioner 
to  Ghent,  along  with  John  Quincy  Adams,  Albert  Galla- 
tin, James  A.  Bayard,  and  Jonathan  Russell;  the  secpjid 
time  to  recoup  his  financial  fortunes. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  m 

Mr.  Speaker  Cannon  and  myself  come  next  in  length 
of  service — four  full  terms,  aggregating  eight  years  each. 
Mr.  Speaker  Cannon  and  I  hold  the  record  for  continuous 
service,  and  come  next  after  Henry  Clay  for  length  of 
service.  Mr.  Speaker  Stevenson,  of  Virginia,  was  elected 
for  four  full  terms,  but  resigned  about  the  middle  of  the 
fourth  term  to  go  as  Minister  to  the  Court  of  St.  James's. 

Politics  were  at  white  heat  at  that  time.  Stevenson 
was  so  confident  that  his  nomination  would  be  promptly 
confirmed  by  the  Senate  that  he  resigned  both  the 
Speakership  and  his  seat  in  the  House;  but,  alas!  the 
Senate  was  anti-Jackson,  and  therefore  anti-Stevenson, 
and  declined  to  confirm  his  nomination  for  more  than  a 
year,  during  which  time  he,  like  Mohammed's  coffin,  was 
suspended  betwixt  heaven  and  earth!  It  is  absolutely 
safe  to  say  that,  had  Mr.  Speaker  Stevenson  Hved  to  the 
age  of  Methuselah  and  held  office  all  the  time,  he  would 
never  have  resigned  prematurely  again.  It's  iEsop's 
story,  with  variations,  about  the  dog  with  a  good,  edible 
bone  in  his  mouth  letting  it  go  to  grab  what  appeared 
to  be  a  larger  bone  in  the  water! 

In  the  middle  of  his  second  and  last  term  Mr.  Speaker 
Crisp  was  tendered  the  appointment  as  Senator  to  fill 
out  an  unexpired  term,  but  his  high  sense  of  duty  to  the 
members  who  had  elected  him  caused  him  to  decHne  the 
proffered  honor.  He  was  subsequently  nominated  for  a 
full  term  in  the  Senate,  under  conditions  where  a  nomi- 
nation was  equivalent  to  an  election,  but  died  before  the 
formal  election  took  place.  His  death  was  a  great  loss 
to  the  pubUc  service,  as  he  was  of  strong  character  and 
splendidly  equipped.  On  the  death  of  Senator  Stone  I 
was  offered  an  appointment  as  Senator,  in  the  middle  of 
my  fourth  term,  but  felt  it  to  be  my  duty  to  the  House 
to  decline  it — which  I  did. 

Nathaniel  Macon,  of  North  Carolina,  Schuyler  Colfax, 
of  Indiana,  James  G.  Blaine,  of  Maine,  John  G.  Carhsle, 


300   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

of  Kentucky,  and  Thomas  B,  Reed,  of  Maine,  served 
three  full  terms  each. 

The  three  terms  each  of  Macon,  Colfax,  Blaine,  and 
Carlisle  were  consecutive.  Reed  was  Speaker  of  the 
Fifty-first,  Fifty-fourth,  and  Fifty-fifth  Congresses,  the 
Democrats  controlling  the  House  in  the  Fifty-second  and 
Fifty-third  Congresses.  There  is  no  doubt  that  he  could 
have  been  Speaker  in  the  Fifty-sixth  and  succeeding  Con- 
gresses, but  he  was  not  in  accord  with  his  party  on  the 
PhiHppine  question,  and,  being  poor,  desired  to  make 
some  money.  So  he  declined  further  service  in  the 
Speakership  and  resigned  from  the  House  to  practise 
law  in  New  York  on  a  guaranty  of  fifty  thousand  dollars 
per  annum.  He  was  nominated  by  only  two  majority 
over  WiUiam  McKinley  when  first  elected  Speaker. 
Reed  lived  only  three  years  after  quitting  Congress,  but 
in  that  brief  span  accumulated  half  a  million  dollars. 

Nathaniel  Macon  was  defeated  for  election  for  a  fourth 
term  by  only  one  vote.  Samuel  J.  Randall,  of  Pennsyl- 
vania, was  Speaker  for  two  full  terms  and  three  months, 
the  three  months  being  the  unexpired  term  of  Michael  C. 
Kerr,  of  Indiana,  who  is  the  only  Speaker  to  have  died 
in  office. 

The  following  Speakers  served  two  full  terms  each: 
Frederick  A.  Muhlenberg,  of  Pennsylvania,  Jonathan 
Dayton,  of  New  Jersey,  Joseph  B.  Varnum,  of  New 
York,  James  K.  Poli,  of  Tennessee,  Linn  Boyd,  of  Ken- 
tucky, Charles  Frederick  Crisp,  of  Georgia,  and  David 
Bremner  Henderson,  of  Iowa.  General  Henderson  and 
myself  are  the  only  Speakers  from  west  of  the  Mississippi. 

John  W.  Taylor,  of  New  York,  served  one  full  term, 
and  three  and  a  half  months  of  Henry  Clay's  fourth 
term,  after  Clay's  second  resignation. 

All  the  rest  of  the  Speakers  served  one  full  term  each 
except  Michael  C.  Kerr,  who  died  in  his  first  and  only 
term;    Langdon  Cheves,  of  South  Carolina,  who  served 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  301 

from  January  18,  1814,  to  March  4,  181 5,  filling  out 
Henry  Clay's  second  term  after  Clay's  first  resignation, 
and  John  Bell,  of  Tennessee,  who  served  from  June  30, 
1834,  to  March  4,  1835,  filling  out  the  unexpired  term  of 
Andrew  Stevenson,  of  Virginia,  who  had  resigned  as  above 
stated.     Muhlenberg's  two  terms  were  not  consecutive. 

A  queer  feature  of  Bell's  Speakership  was  that  his 
principal  opponent  was  James  K.  Polk,  of  the  same  state. 
It  is  the  only  case  of  that  sort  on  record,  and  will  perhaps 
remain  unique  in  our  annals.  Bell  defeated  Polk  for  the 
short  term,  but  Polk  turned  the  tables  on  him  by  defeat- 
ing him  for  the  succeeding  long  term.  Polk  also  defeated 
him  for  the  second  long  term.  The  chances  are  that 
presidential  politics  was  the  cause  of  Bell's  defeat  for 
the  long  terms,  as  he  was  supporting  the  presidential 
candidacy  of  his  friend,  Hugh  Lawson  White,  of  Tennes- 
see, notwithstanding  the  fact  that  President  Jackson,  also 
of  Tennessee,  had  determined  that  Martin  Van  Buren 
should  succeed  himself  in  the  White  House — which  he 
did.  At  one  time  and  for  a  long  time  General  Jackson 
and  Bell  were  close  friends,  as  is  proved  by  Jackson  offer- 
ing Bell  a  place  in  his  Cabinet,  but  the  alienation  of 
affection  growing  out  of  the  White  presidential  candidacy 
drove  Bell  into  the  Whig  party. 

From  the  foregoing  facts  it  will  be  seen  that  Henry 
Clay's  service  in  the  Speakership  was  longest,  Theodore 
M.  Pomeroy's  shortest,  and  that  Joseph  G.  Cannon  and 
myself  served  the  greatest  number  of  consecutive  terms. 

The  statement  that  Pomeroy  was  the  only  man  elected 
Speaker  for  one  day  is  not  in  conflict  with  the  fact  that 
many  men  have  been  Speaker  fro  tempore  by  appoint- 
ment of  the  Speaker  or  by  election  by  the  House,  but  a 
Speaker  pro  tempore  is  not  a  Speaker. 

Seventeen  states  have  furnished  Speakers,  as  follows: 
Massachusetts,  five;  Kentucky  and  Virginia,  four  each; 
Indiana    and    Pennsylvania,   three   each;    New   Jersey, 


302   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

South  Carolina,  New  York,  Tennessee,  Georgia,  and 
Maine,  two  each;  Connecticut,  North  Carolina,  Ohio, 
Iowa,  Illinois,  and  Missouri,  one  each. 

The  aggregate  of  service  by  states  is  as  follows:  Ken- 
tucky, 22  years  and  245  days;  Massachusetts,  10  years; 
Virginia,  13  years;  Pennsylvania,  10  1/31  years;  In- 
diana, 9  2/3  years;  New  Jersey,  6  years;  Tennessee, 
5  years;  South  Carolina,  3  years;  New  York,  31/2 
years;  Georgia,  6  years;  Maine,  12  1/7  years;  North 
Carolina,  6  years;  Missouri,  8  years;  Iowa,  4  years; 
Illinois,  8  years;    Connecticut  and  Ohio,  2  years  each. 

It  is  generally  stated  in  books,  magazines,  and  newspapers, 
and  commonly  accepted  by  the  people,  that  Henry  Clay  was 
the  youngest  man  ever  elected  to  the  Speakership,  but  it 
is  not  true.  That  distinction  properly  belongs  to  Robert 
M.  T.  Hunter,  of  Virginia,  who  was  only  30,  while  Clay 
was  nearly  35.  Mr.  Speaker  Gillett  is  the  oldest  man  ever 
elected.  Speaker  for  his  first  term,  being  when  sworn  in 
(f]  years  7  months  3  days  old.  Hon.  Joseph  G.  Cannon 
is  the  second  oldest  man  ever  elected  to  the  Speakership, 
being  (yj  years  6  months  and  2  days  old  when  first  elected, 
and  verging  on  7  5  when  he  ceased  to  be  Speaker.  The  aver- 
age age  of  the  36  Speakers,  when  first  elected,  is  43  13/36 
years.    The  average  service  of  the  Speakers  is  3  5/7  years. 

The  states  that  have  given  birth  to  Speakers  are:  Vir- 
ginia, with  Clay,  Stevenson,  Jones,  Hunter,  Barbour; 
Massachusetts,  with  Varnum,  Winthrop,  Banks,  Gillett; 
Pennsylvania,  with  Muhlenberg,  Grow,  Randall,  Blaine, 
Davis,  Kerr;  Kentucky,  with  White,  Carlisle,  Clark; 
North  Carolina,  with  Macon,  Polk,  Cannon;  South  Caro- 
lina, with  Cheves  and  Orr;  Connecticut,  with  Trumbull, 
Sedgwick;  Tennessee,  with  Boyd  and  Bell;  Georgia, 
with  Cobb;  New  York,  with  Taylor,  Pomeroy,  Colfax; 
Ohio,  with  Keifer;  Maine,  with  Reed;  New  Jersey,  with 
Dayton  and  Pennington. 

Crisp  was  bom  in  England,  of  American  parents  uav^l* 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  303 

ing  abroad,  and  was  therefore  eligible  to  the  Presidency, 
while  Henderson  was  born  in  Scotland,  of  Scoccli  parents, 
and  therefore  was  ineligible  to  the  Chief-Magistracy  of 
the  Republic 

While  only  one  Speaker,  James  K.  Polk,  reached  the 
White  House,  and  only  three  others,  Clay,  Bell,  and  Blaine, 
received  presidential  nominations,  several  have  striven 
for  it.  Several  Presidents-to-be,  and  one  ex-President, 
have  served  in  the  House.  James  Madison  was  the  first 
of  the  line.  He  sat  in  four  Congresses,  with  Andrew 
Jackson  in  one.  In  the  House  of  the  Twenty-third  Con- 
gress sat  Polk,  Fillmore,  and  Pierce,  all  destined  to  reach 
the  White  House,  and  John  Quincy  Adams,  ex-President. 
In  the  House  of  the  Thirtieth  Congress  sat  Lincoln,  John- 
son, and  John  Quincy  Adams,  while  in  the  House  of  the 
Thirty-ninth  and  Fortieth  Congresses,  in  the  Ohio  dele- 
gation, sat  Garfield  and  Hayes. 

All  the  Speakers  have  been  lawyers,  except  Muhlen- 
berg, who  was  a  Lutheran  preacher,  Colfax  and  Blaine, 
who  were  editors,  and  Randall,  who  was  a  business  man. 
Sedgwick  also  began  life  as  a  preacher,  but  soon  aban- 
doned theology  for  the  law.  After  the  British  captured 
New  York,  where  he  was  preaching,  Muhlenberg  devoted 
his  energies  and  his  talents  to  business  and  to  the  service 
of  his  country. 

The  question  is  perpetually  propounded:  "How  came 
Henry  Clay  to  be  elected  Speaker  of  the  first  House  in  which 
he  served  ? "  The  answer  usually  is  that  it  was  on  account 
of  his    commanding   talents    and    his    vast    popularity. 

Nothing  of  the  sort!  He  was  popular  where  known, 
but  he  was  not  generally  known  at  that  time.  His  amaz- 
ing and  enduring  popularity  came  to  him  because  of  his 
service  in  the  House.  Unquestionably  he  possessed  com- 
manding talents,  but  that  fact  was  not  generally  known. 
He  had  served  two  short  fragments  of  terms  in  the  Senate 
— one,  three,  or  four  months  before  he  was  thirty  years 


304   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

old — and  he  remains  to  this  day  the  only  man  to  accom- 
plish that  unconstitutional  feat;  but  his  brief  service  in 
the  Senate  had  not  made  him  a  national  figure  by  any  man- 
ner of  means.  It  did,  however,  enable  him  to  form  many 
valuable  and  powerful  friends  in  both  House  and  Senate, 
and  no  man  more  easily  made  acquaintances  or  friends. 

These  four  things  won  for  him  the  Speakership:  First, 
the  administration  did  not  want  war  with  Great  Britain, 
but  the  country  did,  and  was  determined  to  have  it. 
Clay  appeared  in  Washington  as  the  war  spirit  incarnate, 
and  ran  as  the  war  candidate.  Second,  out  of  one  hun- 
dred and  sixteen  members,  seventy  of  them  were  new 
members,  and  they  naturally  ralhed  to  Clay's  standard. 
Third,  the  Revolutionary  War  statesmen  were  rapidly 
passing  off  the  stage,  and  a  new  generation  coming  on; 
and  Clay  with  his  graceful  and  gracious  manners,  his 
commanding  presence,  his  enthusiasm,  and  his  shining 
talents,  appealed  powerfully  to  their  imaginations.  Fourth, 
he  was  the  first  candidate  for  Speaker  from  west  of  the 
Alleghanies,  and  the  very  audacity  of  his  candidacy 
amazed  and  pleased  the  Congressional  youngsters.  So 
when  the  test  came  "The  Great  Commoner,"  "The  Mill- 
boy  of  the  Slashes,'*  "Harry  of  the  West,"  won  in  a 
canter,  receiving  as  "the  war  candidate  for  Speaker" 
seventy-five  votes  against  William  Bibb,  of  Georgia, 
"the  peace  candidate,"  with  thirty-eight  votes,  and  three 
for  Nathaniel  Macon.  It  all  reads  Uke  a  tale  out  of  the 
Arabian  Nights,  but  it  is  sober  history. 

Henderson  and  Keifer  were  the  only  Speakers  wounded 
in  battle.  Henderson  lost  a  leg  at  Corinth.  Speaker 
Keifer  was  a  major-general  in  the  Civil  War,  in  which 
he  was  wounded  four  times,  before  his  elevation  to  the 
chair.  He  was  also  a  major-general  in  the  Spanish- 
American  War,  subsequent  to  quitting  the  chair.  Mr. 
Speaker  Banks,  after  leaving  the  chair,  was  a  major- 
general  in  the  Civil  War,  and  Mr.  Speaker  Cobb  a  Con- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  305 

federate  major-general.  Speaker  Crisp,  as  a  boy,  was  a 
Confederate  soldier.  Colfax  was  the  only  Speaker  to 
become  Vice-President. 

Jonathan  Dayton,  of  New  Jersey,  was  the  only  Speaker 
elected  in  a  House  absolutely  controlled  by  his  political 
opponents,  wherein  there  were  only  two  political  parties. 
He  defeated  Nathaniel  Macon  by  one  vote. 

When  I  was  elected  to  my  fourth  term  the  House  stood 
215  Democrats,  215  Republicans,  and  five  Independents. 
In  order  to  succeed  I  had  to  secure  three  Independents. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  four  of  them  voted  for  me.  I  was 
elected  by  a  majority  of  twelve. 

Theodore  Sedgwick  was  the  first  Speaker  who,  upon 
retiring,  was  thanked  by  a  strict  party  vote. 

The  House  decHned  to  thank  Andrew  Stevenson  for 
more  than  a  month  after  he  resigned. 

As  stated  elsewhere,  Winthrop,  Cobb,  and  Banks  were 
really  elected  by  pluralities. 

Dayton,  Winthrop,  Cobb,  Banks,  and  Pennington  were 
each  elected  by  one  vote. 

Many  men  have  been  elected  to  the  Speakership,  or 
defeated,  on  their  records.  During  his  first  and  only 
term  in  Congress,  ex-Governor  Pennington,  of  New  Jer- 
sey, was  elected  Speaker  because  he  had  never  formed  nor 
expressed  an  opinion  on  any  of  the  burning  issues  of  his 
day. 

At  Knoxville,  Tennessee,  I  have  a  dear  friend,  Col. 
John  B.  Brownlow  who  carries  around  in  his  head  a 
vast  mass  of  reminiscences  which  he  owes  to  his  fellow- 
citizens  to  put  into  book  form.  Otherwise  they  will 
perish  with  him.  He  is  a  son  of  the  famous  "Parson" 
Brownlow  who,  after  leaving  the  puli^it  for  politics, 
became  both  Governor  of  Tennessee  and  United  States 
Senator.  When  Colonel  Brownlow  read  in  a  magazine 
the  foregoing  remarks  as  to  Mr.  Speaker  Pennington,  he 
wrote  me  this  pathetic  and  illuminating  story: 

Vol.  I.— 20 


3o6   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

"Your  reference  to  the  election  of  Pennington  as 
Speaker  reminds  me  that  the  Southern  pro-slavery  ad- 
mirers of  Mr.  Clay  rejoiced  over  it  for,  as  I  think,  a 
sufficient  reason.  This  1  say  as  one  taught  by  my  father 
to  regard  Clay  as  the  greatest  man  of  his  generation,  and 
as  more  entitled  to  the  Presidency  than  any  American 
since  Washington;    and  that  I  think  now. 

"Clay  owed  twenty  thousand  dollars,  borrowed  money, 
at  the  Northern  Bank  of  Kentucky,  at  Lexington.  Sev- 
eral times  the  note  had  been  graciously  renewed.  Each 
time  he  told  the  bank  officer,  *1  expect  to  pay  it  when  it 
falls  due.' 

"Finally  he  went  to  the  bank  and  said:  *1  cannot  ask 
you  for  further  indulgence.  Take  my  home,  Ashland,  in 
payment.     I  have  no  other  resource.' 

"To  his  amazement  the  bank  officer  said:  *Mr.  Clay, 
you  owe  nothing  here;  your  debt,  principal  and  interest, 
has  been  paid  in  full.'  *Paid  by  whom!'  exclaimed  Clay. 
'By  your  friends,'  was  the  reply. 

"*Tell  me  the  names  of  those  friends,'  he  said. 

"'That  I  decline  to  do,'  said  the  bank  official,  'because 
I  gave  my  word  not  to  do  it.  They  do  not  wish  their 
names  known,  because  they  do  not  wish  you  to  feel 
obHgated  to  them.' 

"Then  the  tears  trickled  down  the  face  of  Henry  Clay 
as  he  exclaimed,  *My  God!  did  any  man  ever  have  such 
friends?' 

"A  few  days  before  the  event  described,  a  young  man 
in  the  early  twenties,  who  was  then  a  Whig  member  of 
the  New  Jersey  Legislature,  had  called  at  the  bank,  pre- 
senting introductory  letters  from  Eastern  friends  of  Mr. 
Clay,  with  the  funds  to  liquidate  his  ind'=^btedness  in  full, 
on  condition  that  Clay  should  never  know  the  identity 
of  the  parties  who  did  it,  and  Clay  died  without  knowing. 

"The  young  man  who  did  this  was  WiUiam  Pennington, 
later  the  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representatives.    While 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  307 

in  Lexington  he  never  called  to  see  Clay,  and  Clay  never 
knew  he  had  been  there.  Clay's  friends  in  the  East  had 
heard  of  his  embarrassment,  but  not  from  Mr.  Clay.  I 
remember  distinctly  that  when  Mr.  Clay's  death  was 
announced  I  met  old  Whigs  on  the  streets  of  Knoxville, 
in  tears.  No  man  in  all  our  history  had  friends  so  de- 
voted, unless  Jackson  be  excepted." 

While  at  it.  Colonel  Brownlow  wrote  the  following 
anecdote  about  General  Jackson  and  James  K.  Polk, 
which  shows  the  Iron  Soldier  of  the  Hermitage  in  the 
delectable  role  of  match-maker: 

"The  wife  of  James  K.  Polk  was  Sarah  Childress.  I 
presume  she  was  a  kinswoman  of  Matilda  Childress,  wife 
of  John  Catron,  of  the  United  States  Supreme  Court,  as 
they  were  natives  of  adjoining  counties.  I  knew  Mrs. 
Polk  personally.  She  was  a  splendid  woman,  one  of  the 
most  attractive  I  ever  met.  She  died  about  1886,  at 
about  eighty-eight  years  of  age. 

** General  Jackson,  at  Murfreesboro,  the  home  of  Miss 
Childress,  met  Polk.  He  said  to  him,  *  James,  I  have 
heard  that  you  have  broken  your  engagement  to  marry 
Sallie  Childress.' 

"James  replied,  'General,  that  is  not  true.' 

"Jackson  said,  *I  am  glad  to  hear  you  say  that.  Sallie 
is  a  good  girl  and  I  would  regret  to  see  you  disappoint 
her.'  (The  Childress  family  were  all  ardent  friends  of 
Jackson.) 

"Then  James  said,  'Sallie  and  I  will  be  married,  but 
I  suppose  the  rumor  that  our  engagement  was  broken 
grew  out  of  the  fact  that  our  marriage  has  been  indefi- 
nitely postponed.' 

"'Why,'  said  the  'Hero  of  New  Orleans,'  'has  it  been 
indefinitely  postponed?' 

"'Because,'  replied  James,  'I  feel  too  poor  to  marry 
now.' 

***Tut,  tuti'  replied  Jackson,  'th^t  is  nonsense,  Jam€S| 


3o8   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

no  young  man  of  your  talents  and  industry  is  too  poor 
to  marry,  and  I  believe  in  early  marriages/  So  upon  the 
advice  of  Jackson  the  future  Speaker  of  the  House  and 
President  of  the  United  States  lost  no  time  in  consum- 
mating his  engagement  with  Sallie  Childress. 

"This  story  has  never  been  pubHshed,  but  I  am  sure 
it  is  authentic." 

I  am  the  only  Democrat,  living  or  dead,  ever  nominated 
for  his  first  term  in  the  Speakership  by  a  unanimous  vote 
of  a  Democratic  caucus.  I  have  been  nominated  that 
way  seven  times.  All  other  Democrats  had  to  fight  for 
their  first  nominations. 

Every  once  in  a  while  somebody  suggests  that  some 
eminent  citizen,  not  a  member  of  the  House,  should  be 
elected  Speaker.  Why  this  suggestion  is  made  puzzles 
me.  There  is  no  constitutional  or  statutory  inhibition 
against  an  outsider's  being  elected  Speaker,  but,  while 
neither  a  prophet  nor  the  son  of  a  prophet,  I  make  bold 
to  predict  that  no  outsider  will  ever  be  elected  so  long  as 
the  earth  spins  on  its  axis  or  slides  down  the  ecliptic.  It 
is  a  thing  incredible. 

Taken  all  in  all,  the  thirty-seven  Speakers  compare 
very  favorably,  in  both  ability  and  character,  with  the 
twenty-eight  Presidents.  There  are  the  names  of  some 
great  men,  and  of  only  a  few  small  men,  on  the  roster  of 
the  Speakers  of  the  House  of  Representatives.  Five 
Presidents,  the  elder  Harrison,  Taylor,  Lincoln,  Garfield, 
and  McKinley,  have  died  in  ofiice;  but  only  one  Speaker, 
Michael  C.  Kerr,  of  Indiana. 

Three  men  and  only  three  have  been  elected  to  the 
Speakership  during  their  first  term  of  service  in  the  House 
— Frederick  A.  Muhlenberg,  Henry  Clay,  and  WiUiam 
Pennington.  Muhlenberg  was  elected  on  the  first  day 
of  the  First  Congress.  He  had  served  in  the  Continental 
Congress.     Clay  had  served  a  short  time  in  the  Senate. 

It  is  a  peculiar  and  interesting  fact  that  no  man  was 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  309 

ever  elected  Speaker  chiefly  because  of  his  knowledge  of 
parliamentary  law.  Speakers  are  elected  by  reason  of  the 
possession  of  other  qualities.  The  quality  of  leadership 
is  usually  the  thing  which  enables  a  man  to  win  the 
glittering  prize.  It  goes  without  saying  that  some  of 
the  Speakers  have  been  skilled  parliamentarians.  The 
Speaker  is  provided  with  a  "clerk  to  the  Speaker's 
table,"  popularly  known  as  the  ** parliamentary  clerk." 
His  principal  business  is  to  be  entirely  familiar  with  the 
rules  and  precedents,  so  as  to  be  able  to  furnish  them  to 
the  Speaker  at  a  moment's  notice.  Most  points  of  order 
are  disposed  of  instanter  and  without  debate.  It  is  only 
on  rare  occasions  that  a  parliamentary  question  of  great 
interest  or  difliculty  is  presented  to  the  Speaker.  These 
are  argued  in  extenso.  While  the  Speaker  is  listening  to 
the  debate,  his  fidus  Achates,  alias  "the  parhamentary 
clerk,"  is  as  busy  as  a  bee  collating  the  precedents,  if 
any  there  be,  which  he  places  before  the  Speaker,  who 
gives  his  decision  with  or  without  giving  reasons  for  the 
same,  as  the  situation  seems  to  him  to  demand.  If  it 
is  a  new  question,  he  usually  renders  an  opinion  more 
or  less  elaborate,  as  that  opinion  blazes  the  way  on  that 
question  for  himself  and  his  successors. 

No  Speaker  is  bound  to  follow  precedents,  but  unless 
they  are  palpably  wrong  they  are  very  persuasive.  In- 
deed, a  rule,  though  wrong,  may  have  been  followed 
so  long  that  it  would  be  revolutionary  and  unwise  to  re- 
verse it. 

For  instance,  when  the  House  bill  revising  Schedule  K 
was  sent  over  to  the  Senate,  that  body  struck  out  all  after 
the  enacting  clause,  and  inserted  a  new  bill.  When  the 
amended  bill  came  back  to  the  House,  Hon.  James  R. 
Mann,  the  indefatigable  and  very  capable  Republican 
floor  leader,  raised  the  point  that  as  the  House  alone 
was  empowered  by  the  Constitution  to  originate  revenue 
measures,  and  as  the  Senate  had  only  the  power  of  amend- 


310   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

ment,  the  Senate  in  substituting  an  entirely  new  bill 
under  the  guise  of  amendment  was  acting  ultra  vires. 

I  overruled  his  point  of  order,  stating,  however,  that  if 
I  had  been  Speaker  of  the  House  in  the  First  Congress, 
and  his  point  of  order  had  been  raised,  I  would  have  sus- 
tained it,  but  that  the  House  and  the  country  had 
acquiesced  in  such  action  on  the  part  of  the  Senate  for 
one  hundred  and  twenty-two  years,  and  it  had  become 
part  and  parcel  of  the  modus  operandi  in  constructing 
tariff  bills. 

As  a  general  thing,  I  ruled  promptly,  giving  no  reasons. 
I  learned  that  when  quite  a  youth,  from  a  very  excellent, 
well-educated,  and  successful  nisi  prius  judge,  who  told 
me  that  he  rarely  gave  reasons  for  a  ruHng,  because  he 
might  make  the  right  ruHng  and  give  the  wrong  reasons 
therefor. 

It  is  a  matter  of  common  knowledge  that  any  member 
may  appeal  from  any  decision  of  the  Speaker  to  the 
House  itself;  and  the  appeal  is  debatable  unless  debate 
is  cut  off  by  a  motion  to  table  the  appeal. 

During  the  eight  years  of  my  service  as  Speaker  there 
were  nine  appeals  taken  from  my  decisions.  But  I  was 
sustained  in  every  case,  and  by  more  than  a  party  vote, 
except  that  just  two  days  before  the  expiration  of  my 
last  term  as  Speaker,  in  a  hotly  contested  election  case, 
the  Republicans,  wao  were  temporarily  in  the  majority, 
overruled  one  of  my  decisions,  which  was  an  absolutely 
just  decision,  but  they  did  it  to  get  their  contestant 
seated. 

In  these  latter  years  it  is  only  occasionally  that  a 
Speaker,  or  chairman  of  the  committee  of  the  whole 
House  on  the  state  of  the  Union,  renders  an  opinion  of 
permanent  and  far-reaching  consequence.  Most  ques- 
tions have  been  decided — many  of  them  several  times — 
and  those  decisions  serve  as  mandatory  precedents. 
Tennyson  explains  that 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  311 

Freedom  slowly  broadens  down, 
From  precedent  to  precedent. 

Most  assuredly  "precedent"  largely  controls  in  the 
conduct  of  the  House.  Besides  his  decision  in  the  Ran- 
dolph-Calhoun matter,  heretofore  cited,  Henry  Clay 
rendered  other  important  decisions.  Being  among  the 
earlier  Speakers,  he  was  in  a  manner  blazing  the  legis- 
lative trail. 

It  goes  without  saying  that  Speaker  Reed's  counting 
of  a  quorum  was  an  epochal  achievement. 

While  Carlisle  was  Speaker,  ex-Gov.  James  B.  Mc- 
Creary,  presiding  in  the  committee  of  the  whole  House 
on  the  state  of  the  Union,  rendered  an  opinion  of  tre- 
mendous import.  Congress  had,  at  a  previous  session, 
authorized  a  steel,  armor-plated  battle-ship — ^just  one — 
and  it  was  the  first.  When  McCreary  was  in  the  chair 
the  Navy  Appropriation  bill  was  under  consideration.  It 
contained  a  provision  for  another  steel  armor-plated 
battle-ship.  Somebody  raised  the  point  of  order  that 
that  item  must  go  out  of  the  bill,  because  it  violated  the 
well-established  rule  that  new  legislation  cannot  be 
enacted  in  an  appropriation  bill.  It  was  argued,  on  the 
contrary,  that  building  a  new  navy  was  "a  continuing 
work,"  and  therefore  the  item  in  controversy  should  not 
be  excluded  by  the  rule.  McCreary  took  the  latter  view, 
and  ruled  that  the  appropriation  for  the  new  battle-ship 
was  in  order.  By  that  decision  our  new  navy  was  made 
possible. 

Governor  McCreary  was  a  colonel  in  Gen.  John  H. 
Morgan's  cavalry,  member  and  Speaker  of  the  Kentucky 
Legislature,  twelve  years  a  Representative  in  Congress, 
part  of  the  time  chairman  of  the  great  Committee  on 
Foreign  Affairs,  Governor  of  Kentucky  for  two  full  terms 
of  four  years  each,  at  periods  thirty-eight  years  apart, 
a  delegate  to  the  Brussels  Monetary  Convention  of  1893, 


312   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

and  a  Senator  of  the  United  States.  But  by  all  his 
services  in  the  army  and  in  the  various  high  stations  in 
civil  life  put  together,  his  conduct  never  had  as  much 
influence  on  human  affairs  as  his  parliamentary  decision 
holding  that  the  building  of  the  new  navy  was  a  continu- 
ing work.  McCreary's  decision  was  adhered  to  from 
1887  till  February,  1919,  when  Hon.  Finis  J.  Garrett,  of 
Tennessee,  one  of  the  ablest  men  in  the  House,  was  in 
the  chair  and  overruled  it — and  from  a  parliamentary 
standpoint  Garrett  was  correct. 

Colonel  McCreary  delighted  to  tell  reminiscences  of 
Morgan's  raid  through  Indiana  and  Ohio,  and  well  he 
might,  for  his  part  in  that  remarkable  ride  was  the  most 
notable  and  spectacular  event  in  his  military  career.  He 
was  promoted  from  major  to  lieutenant-colonel  at  the 
battle  of  Green  River  Bridge  in  the  beginning  of  the 
great  raid,  July  4,  1863,  when  his  colonel,  Chenault,  was 
killed  and  where  General  Morgan  lost  about  three  hun- 
dred men  in  killed  and  wounded. 

He  said  the  bridge  was  held  and  successfully  defended 
by  a  Colonel  Moore  and  seventy  Michigan  infantrymen 
in  rifle-pits,  behind  an  insurmountable  chevaux-de-frise. 
General  Morgan  sent  in  a  flag  of  truce,  demanding  the 
surrender  of  the  Union  troops.  Colonel  Moore  sent  back 
the  curt  answer:  "The  4th  of  July  is  a  blanked  poor  day 
for  a  Union  man  to  surrender  on!" 

McCreary  told  me  another  story  illustrating  the  hos- 
pitality of  Kentuckians  under  even  the  most  discouraging 
circumstances.  He  said  the  weather  was  very  hot  and 
dusty,  and  when  the  Confederate  raiders  finally  surren- 
dered they  were  weary  and  dirty,  having  had  no  change 
of  clothing,  and  hardly  any  rest  or  sleep,  for  nearly  three 
weeks.  McCreary  happened  to  be  in  command  of  the 
last  of  Morgan's  men  to  surrender.  When  they  ran  up  the 
white  flag  the  Union  general,  Hobson,  also  a  Kentuckian, 
rode  up  and  inquired,  **Who  commands  these  troops?" 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  313 

Whereupon  McCreary,  very  much  bedraggled  and  cov- 
ered with  dust,  rode  forth  and  repHed,  **I  do." 

"Who  are  you?"  asked  General  Hobson. 

"I  am  Lieut.-Col.  James  B.  McCreary." 

Then  Hobson  with  a  grin  said:  "You  are  a  fine-looking 
lieutenant-colonel,  aren't  you?  What  you  most  need  is 
a  good  drink."  Then  suiting  the  action  to  the  word,  he 
drew  from  his  holster  a  flask  of  Kentucky  bourbon  and 
ministered  to  the  thirst  of  his  prisoner. 

Whether  anybody  gave  General  Hobson  a  drink — a 
year  or  so  later  when,  the  fortunes  of  war  having  changed, 
Morgan's  men  captured  him  at  Cynthiana,  Kentucky — 
I  never  heard. 

In  my  eight  years  as  Speaker  I  rendered  hundreds  of 
decisions — usually  having  precedents  to  guide  or  influ- 
ence. But  I  decided  one  important  point  which,  strange 
to  say,  had  never  been  raised  before,  and  that  was,  where 
the  House  is  voting  on  a  motion  to  pass  a  bill  over  the 
President's  veto,  whether  in  making  up  the  necessary 
two-thirds  vote  those  who  answer  "present"  should  be 
counted,  or  those  only  who  vote  "aye"  and  "no."  I 
held  that  those  answering  "present"  should  not  be 
counted,  and  on  appeal  from  my  ruling  the  House  by  an 
overwhelming  majority  sustained  my  decision. 

The  case  was  this:  When  the  roll  was  called  on  passing 
the  Underwood  Wool  bill,  ten  members  answered  "pres- 
ent." If  they  were  counted  the  House  had  not  voted  to 
pass  the  bill  over  President  Taft's  veto.  If  they  were 
not  counted  the  House  had  passed  it  over  his  veto. 

The  reasons  for  my  decision  are  so  cogent  that  I  am 
certain  that  my  precedent  will  be  followed  for  all  time 
to  come.     Here  they  are.     The  Constitution  says: 

"In  all  such  cases  [that  is,  in  cases  of  voting  to  pass  a 
bill  over  the  President's  veto]  the  votes  of  both  Houses 
shall  be  determined  by  yeas  and  nays,  and  the  names  of 
the  persons  voting  for  and  against  the  bill  shall  be  entered 


314   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

on  the  journal  of  each  House  respectively/*    Not  one 
word  touching  those  who  answer  "present." 

Voting  on  passing  a  bill  over  the  President's  veto  is  the 
only  action  of  Congress  where  the  Constitution  requires 
a  yea-and-nay  vote. 

If  those  answering  "present"  are  to  be  counted,  mani- 
festly they  must  be  counted  as  voting  "no."  There  can 
be  no  other  conclusion.  I  took  the  pains,  after  my  de- 
cision was  rendered,  to  ascertain  how  the  ten  members 
who  answered  "present"  would  have  voted  had  they 
been  free  to  vote,  and  I  discovered  that  eight  would  have 
voted  "aye,"  while  only  two  would  have  voted  "no." 

The  formula  used  by  the  Speaker  in  putting  the  ques- 
tion on  passing  a  bill  over  the  President's  veto  is  this 
stately  and  sonorous  collocation  of  words:  "Will  the 
House,  on  reconsideration,  agree  to  pass  the  bill,  the  ob- 
jections of  the  President  to  the  contrary  notwith- 
standing?" 

It  was  on  that  occasion  that  the  late  Augustus  Peabody 
Gardner,  of  Massachusetts,  demonstrated  that  he  pos- 
sessed perfect  mental  integrity.  He  was  one  of  the  best 
parliamentarians  of  the  House.  As  soon  as  I  rendered 
my  opinion,  without  giving  any  reason  for  it,  he  arose 
with  The  Parliamentary  Manual  in  his  hand  and  said: 
"Mr.  Speaker,  I  appeal  from  the  decision  of  the  chair. 
I  have  an  authority  exactly  in  point." 

I  replied,  "I  know  on  what  you  rely — a  foot-note  in 
The  Manual.  It  deceives  you  just  as  it  deceived  me  for 
a  while,  but  the  foot-note  is  wrong  and  misleading.  That 
foot-note  does  not  correspond  to  the  decision  on  which 
it  seems  to  be  based.  Mr.  Underwood  promptly  moved 
to  table  Mr.  Gardner's  appeal.  While  the  motion  to 
table  is  not  debatable,  I  wanted  Gardner  to  have  time 
to  hunt  up  the  decision  in  Hind's  Precedents.  Conse- 
quently I  permitted  members  to  talk  about  my  decision 
awhile. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  315 

As  soon  as  Gardner  found  the  decision  he  arose  and 
said:  "Mr.  Speaker,  your  decision  is  correct  and  I  with- 
draw my  appeal" — an  honest  statement  which  under  the 
circumstances  many  men  would  not  have  made,  by  reason 
of  pride  of  opinion.  Some  other  member  renewed  the 
appeal,  and  Underwood  promptly  moved  to  table  the 
appeal,  and  his  motion  carried  by  two  hundred  and  forty 
to  ten. 

When  it  was  over  Mr.  Gardner  arose  and  said:  "Mr. 
Speaker,  your  decision  is  of  so  much  importance  that  you 
should  render  a  more  elaborate  opinion,"  which  I  did. 
It  was  printed  in  The  Congressional  Record,  and  was  in 
substance  as  is  set  forth  above. 

Nearly  a  dozen  Representatives  volunteered  to  enter 
the  Great  War.  Mr.  Gardner  was  among  the  first.  He 
said  that  he  had  advocated  "preparedness"  so  long  and 
so  strenuously  that  he  could  not,  with  a  clear  conscience 
and  a  straight  face,  stay  at  home  while  others  were  going 
forth  to  battle.  By  reason  of  having  been  a  captain  in 
the  Spanish-American  War  he  was  appointed  lieutenant- 
colonel.  Soon  finding  that  the  regiment  to  which  he 
belonged  had  no  immediate  chance  of  being  sent  to 
France,  he  procured  his  own  demotion  by  being  assigned 
as  major  in  a  Georgia  regiment  which  was  soon  to  be  sent 
overseas.  I  have  heard  or  read  of  but  one  other  such  case. 
Senator  John  Tyler  Morgan,  of  Alabama,  became  a  Con- 
federate colonel  at  the  beginning  of  the  Civil  War,  and 
was  soon  promoted  to  be  a  brigadier.  In  some  battle  in 
Virginia  all  the  field  officers  in  his  old  regiment  were 
killed,  and  the  remaining  officers  and  men  of  that  regi- 
ment begged  him  to  resign  as  brigadier-general  and  be- 
come their  colonel  once  more,  which  he  did.  Such  noble 
acts  of  self-abnegation  as  those  of  Morgan  and  Gardner 
are  so  rare  among  men  that  they  deserve  to  be  gratefully 
rernembered  by  their  countrymen. 

Gardner  unfortunately  did  not  live  to  go  across  the 


3i6  MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Atlantic.  He  died  a  short  time  after  we  entered  the  war, 
and  was  sincerely  mourned  by  all  his  fellow-members. 

He  was  an  able,  industrious,  courageous,  patriotic 
man,  faithful  in  the  discharge  of  every  duty  and  in  every 
relation  of  life.  He  was  an  incisive  speaker,  a  close 
student,  a  strong  debater,  widely  read,  and  above  all  was 
unafraid. 

He  was  the  only  one  of  the  Congressional  volunteers 
who  died  in  the  army  during  the  Great  War.  "Greater 
love  hath  no  man  than  that  he  give  up  his  life  for  his 
friend  *'  or  country. 


CHAPTER  XII 

Campaign  of  1892 — ^Tom  Johnson  and  Larry  Neal — Fight  over  tariff  plank  in 
convention — Crisp  re-elected  Speaker — Silver  debate — My  tariff  speech 
— Income  tax — Wilson  chairman  of  Ways  and  Means — Gorman's  proph- 
ecy— A  question  of  veracity. 

vHTHE  dominant  question  in  the  campaign  of  1892  was 
A  the  reform  of  the  tariff  downward.  The  issue  was 
sharply  drawn.  In  the  platforms  there  was  no  dodging. 
The  RepubHcan  platform  ran?) 

"  We  reaffirm  the  American  doctrine  of  protection.  We 
call  attention  to  its  growth  abroad.  We  maintain  that 
the  prosperous  condition  of  our  country  is  largely  due  to 
the  wise  revenue  legislation  of  the  last  Republican  Con-, 
gress.  We  believe  that  all  articles  which  cannot  be 
produced  in  the  United  States,  except  luxuries,  should  be 
admitted  free  of  duty,  and  that  on  all  imports  coming 
into  competition  with  the  products  of  American  labor 
there  should  be  levied  duties  equal  to  the  difference 
between  wages  abroad  and  at  home." 

The  Democrats  stated  their  position  in  these  ringing 
words : 

"  We  denounce  Republican  protection  as  a  fraud — a  rob- 
bery of  the  great  majority  of  the  American  people  for 
the  benefit  of  the  few.  We  declare  it  to  be  a  funda- 
mental principle  of  the  Democratic  party  that  the  Federal 
government  has  no  constitutional  power  to  impose  and 
collect  tariff  duties  except  for  the  purpose  of  revenue  only, 
and  we  demand  that  the  collection  of  such  taxes  shall  be 
limited  to  the  necessities  of  the  government  when  honestly 
and  economically  administered." 


3i8   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Most  of  the  Democratic  leaders,  including  Mr.  Cleve- 
land himself,  had  no  idea  of  making  such  a  bold  and 
sweeping  declaration  as  the  one  set  forth  above.  Con- 
sequently, they  agreed  upon  a  tariff  plank  of  the  variety 
which  in  popular  parlance  is  denominated  a  "straddle." 
This  "straddle"  was  duly  incorporated  into  the  platform, 
which  was  reported  to  the  Chicago  convention  by  a 
majority  of  the  committee  on  resolutions  through  Col. 
Charles  H.  Jones,  editor  of  The  St.  Louis  Republic, 
chairman;  but  that  committee  was  destined  to  be  rudely 
awakened  and  soundly  beaten. 

Prominent  in  the  Ohio  delegation  in  that  convention 
sat  one  of  nature's  noblemen,  Tom  L.  Johnson — "a 
fighter  from  the  headwaters  of  Bitter  Creek" — brave  as 
a  lion,  true  as  steel,  honest  as  the  day  is  long,  and  blithe 
as  a  lark.  By  birth  a  Kentuckian,  he  was  blood-kin  to 
that  grim  soldier,  Col.  Richard  M.  Johnson,  commonly 
called  "Old  Dick,"  who  won  renown  at  the  battle  of  the 
River  Thames  by  his  gallantry  and  by  slaying  Tecumseh, 
one  of  the  greatest  of  all  Indians.  Colonel  Johnson  was 
subsequently  a  Representative  and  Senator  in  Congress, 
as  well  as  Vice-President.  It  may  be  remarked  paren- 
thetically that  he  is  the  only  Vice-President  elected  by 
the  Senate  of  the  United  States  when  the  Electoral  Col- 
leges failed  to  elect.  Tom  Johnson — ^Tom,  mark  you, 
not  Thomas — was  a  roly-poly  statesman  of  middle  stature 
in  extra-good  flesh,  with  a  magnificent  head  crowned  with 
abundant  chestnut  curls  and  an  exceedingly  handsome 
face,  usually  wreathed  in  smiles.  He  always  dressed  in 
exquisite  taste,  and  enjoyed  Hfe  to  the  full.  He  had 
risen  from  the  humble  position  of  currying  mules  for  a 
street-car  company  to  being  both  a  muKimillionaire  and 
a  Representative  in  Congress. 

I  saw  him  do  a  thing  in  the  Fifty-third  Congress  which 
proved  his  sincerity  as  an  out-and-out  free-trader  beyond 
the  shs^dow  of  a  doubt.    He  yv^s  tjie  second  largest  manu-^ 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  319 

facturer  of  steel  rails  in  the  world,  and  yet  when  the 
authors  of  the  Wilson  Tariff  bill  reported  a  tariff  rate  of 
seven  dollars  and  a  half  per  ton  on  steel  rails,  he  fought  it 
tooth  and  nail — ^while  all  the  world  wondered!  He  sol- 
emnly and  wrathfully  affirmed  that  they  did  not  need 
any  protection,  and  if  Congress  would  let  them  alone 
American  steel-rail  manufacturers  would  dominate  the 
markets  of  the  world.  God,  so  we  are  told,  moves  in  a 
mysterious  way  His  wonders  to  perform.  Likewise  tariff 
builders — sometimes.  It  was  an  amazing  spectacle  to 
see  them  force  on  Johnson's  steel  rails  a  heavy  tariff 
which  he  swore  he  did  not  need  or  want. 

It  is  a  matter  of  common  knowledge  that  as  mayor  of 
Cleveland  he  exhausted  his  physical  energies  and  expended 
his  large  fortune  in  his  long,  bitter,  and  successful  fight 
to  force  three-cent  street-car  fares  for  the  people  of  that 
ambitious  city;  which  more  than  any  other  one  cause 
enabled  her  to  pass  Cincinnati  in  population  and  in 
prestige.  Tom  Johnson  was  a  reformer  who  reformed 
men  and  things.  The  Ohio  member  of  the  committee 
on  resolutions  was  the  Marshal  Ney  of  the  Buckeye 
Democracy  and  Tom  Johnson's  pet  crony,  Lawrence  T. 
Neal,  popularly  known  as  "Larry.''  They  were  par 
nohile  fratrum — a  noble  pair  of  political  brethren.  Neal 
offered  an  amendment  to  the  platform  by  striking  out 
the  elaborate  and  meaningless  tariff  straddle  and  insert- 
ing the  radical  tariff  plank  above  quoted.  No  doubt 
that  Tom  Johnson  aided  and  abetted  him  in  its  construc- 
tion and  encouraged  him  to  introduce  it.  The  fight  was 
short,  but  bloody  and  decisive.  So  far  as  the  debate  was 
concerned,  Tom  Johnson  not  only  stood  by  consenting 
to  his  friend's  fierce  assault  upon  the  platform  and  plat- 
form makers,  after  the  manner  of  Saul  at  the  stoning  of 
Stephen,  but  he  led  the  storming  column  in  person  with 
the  dash  of  Murat.  When  the  battle  ended  Johnson, 
Neal,  and  their  troops  were   victors  by   a   two   to   one 


320   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

majority.  Those  who  assumed  to  be  Mr.  Cleveland's 
conscience-keepers — and  even  Mr.  Cleveland  himself — 
denounced  the  insertion  of  the  Neal  plank  as  an  effort 
to  defeat  him— a  most  lame,  impotent,  and  preposterous 
conclusion.  The  timid  were  in  a  panic,  the  time-servers 
were  aghast,  the  double-dealers  were  in  the  mulligrubs, 
but  nevertheless  Mr.  Cleveland  won  an  overwhelming 
victory  on  the  Neal- Johnson  tariff  plank  which  he  did 
not  want  and  the  authors  of  which  he  never  forgave. 

Notwithstanding  the  fact  that  the  Democrats  swept 
the  country  almost  solely  on  the  tariff  issue  in  1892, 
President  Cleveland  called  the  Congress  to  meet  in  ex- 
traordinary session  August  7,  1893 — not  to  revise  the 
tariff  downward,  for  which  purpose  he  and  it  were  both 
chiefly  elected — but  to  repeal  the  purchasing  clause  of 
the  Sherman  Silver  law,  which  was  only  a  minor  issue 
in  the  campaign.  That  extraordinary  session  split  the 
Democratic  party  wide  open  and  was  the  source  of  all 
our  woe,  which  sent  us  wandering  in  the  wilderness  for 
sixteen  years,  and  from  which  we  escaped  in  191 2  only 
through  the  factional  division  in  the  Republican  Chicago 
convention. 

Both  Houses  of  the  Congress  organized  August  7th. 
On  the  8th  the  President  sent  to  Congress  his  message. 
The  Free  Silver  leaders  and  the  Single  Gold  Standard 
leaders  entered  into  the  following  agreement  as  to  pro- 
cedure on  the  bill  to  repeal  the  purchasing  clause  of  the 
Sherman  Silver  law: 

"  Ordered  by  the  House  that  H.  R.  No.  i  shall  be  taken 
up  for  immediate  consideration  and  considered  for  four- 
teen days.  During  such  consideration  night  sessions  may 
be  held  for  debate  only,  at  the  request  of  either  side. 
The  daily  sessions  to  commence  at  11  a.m.  and  continue 
until  5  P.M.  Eleven  days  of  the  debate  to  be  given  to 
general  debate  under  the  rules  of  the  last  House  regulat- 
ing general  debate,  the  time  to  be  equally  divided  between 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  321 

the  two  sides,  as  the  Speaker  may  determine.  The  last 
three  days  of  debate  may  be  devoted  to  the  consideration 
of  the  bill  and  the  amendments  herein  provided  for  under 
the  usual  five-minute  rule  of  the  House,  as  in  Com- 
mittee of  the  Whole  House.  General  leave  to  print  is 
hereby  granted. 

"Order  of  amendments:  The  vote  shall  be  taken  first 
on  the  amendment  providing  for  the  free  coinage  of  silver 
at  the  present  ratio.  If  that  fail,  then  a  separate  vote 
to  be  had  on  a  similar  amendment  proposing  a  ratio  of 
seventeen  to  one;  if  that  fails,  then  on  one  proposing  a 
ratio  of  eighteen  to  one;  if  that  fails,  then  on  one  propos- 
ing a  ratio  of  nineteen  to  one;  if  that  fails,  on  one  propos- 
ing a  ratio  of  twenty  to  one. 

"If  the  above  amendments  fail,  it  shall  be  in  order  to 
offer  an  amendment  reviving  the  Act  of  the  28th  of  Feb- 
ruary, 1878,  restoring  the  standard  silver  dollar,  com- 
monly known  as  the  Bland-Allison  Act,  the  vote  then  to 
be  taken  on  the  engrossment  and  third  reading  of  the  bill 
as  amended,  and  on  the  bill  itself,  if  the  amendments 
shall  have  been  voted  down,  and  on  the  final  passage  of 
the  bill  without  other  intervening  motions." 

On  the  Saturday  night  preceding  the  7th  there  was 
a  meeting  in  the  hall  of  the  House  of  all  Silver  Repre- 
sentatives without  regard  to  political  affiliations,  to  take 
counsel  together.  Out  of  a  membership  of  three  hundred 
and  fifty-nine  there  were  two  hundred  and  one  present. 
Over  this  meeting  Judge  David  Browning  Culbertson, 
of  Texas,  presided.  From  the  large  attendance  we  con- 
cluded that  we  were  sure  winners;  but  alack!  and  also 
alas!  we  had  not  included  in  our  calculations  the  enor- 
mous power  of  patronage.  When  the  test  came,  two 
weeks  later,  instead  of  two  hundred  and  one  votes  we 
could  muster  only  one  hundred  and  one.  It  is  folly  to 
claim  that  the  debate  had  wrought  the  change.  Patron- 
age did  it,  and  there  is  no  use  blinking  the  fact.     The 

Vol.  I.— 21 


322   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

people  did  not  forget  it — for  at  the  first  opportunity  they 
retired  the  floppers  to  private  Kfe — and  permanently. 

The  late  John  E.  Lamb,  a  former  Representative  from 
the  Terre  Haute  district,  a  political  protege  of  Senator 
Daniel  W.  Voorhees,  one  of  the  most  eloquent  of  orators, 
told  me  in  his  own  house  a  pathetic  story  touching  Voor- 
hees's  change  of  base  on  the  coinage  question.  Voorhees, 
who  had  been  a  radical  Silver  man,  was  chairman  of  the 
Senate  Finance  Committee  in  1893,  which  committee^ 
handled  coinage  legislation — which  position  of  necessity, 
gave  him  great  influence  on  that  subject.  Consequently,^ 
when  Senator  Voorhees  lined  up  with  President  Cleve- 
land in  favor  of  the  Single  Gold  Standard,  the  Silver  men* 
were  thoroughly  indignant  and  said  many  hard  things 
to  and  about  **The  tall  Sycamore  of  the  Wabash." 
Lamb  said  that  Voorhees  mourned  the  remnant  of  his 
days  about  changing  sides,  and  that  he  honestly  believed 
that  it  shortened  the  brilliant  Senator's  Hfe.  According 
to  his  tale,  Voorhees  declared  over  and  over  again  that  he 
never  did  change  his  views  on  the  coinage  question,  but 
that  he  faced  this  situation:  "In  Indiana  were  thousands 
of  faithful  Democrats  who  had  followed  him  loyally  and 
unfalteringly  through  three  decades.  If  he  ahgned  him- 
self with  the  President  he  could  reward  at  least  some  of 
them.  If  he  did  not,  all  of  his  friends  would  be  cut  off 
from  any  hope  of  preferment,  and  that  out  of  love  for 
these  veterans  who  had  borne  the  heat  and  burden  of 
the  day  in  so  many  hot  conflicts — and  political  conflicts 
were  nowhere  on  earth  hotter  than  in  Indiana — he  sup- 
ported the  presidential  policy."  That  in  brief  is  the 
story  as  told  to  me  in  great  detail.  No  man  ever  had  a 
more  tender  heart  than  Voorhees,  and  the  foregoing  story 
makes  one  have  a  kindly  feeling  for  one  of  Indiana's 
greatest  sons.  No  doubt  other  Senators  and  Represent- 
atives were  actuated  by  motives  similar  to  those  of 
Voorhees. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  323 

On  the  9th  the  oratorical  storm  broke  in  the  House 
with  unspeakable  fury — a  storm  which  raged  for  years 
in  Congress  and  out,  and  which  destroyed  more  men  than 
did  the  siege  of  Troy;  but  an  old  adage  worthy  of  accept- 
ance hath  it  that  "It  is  an  ill  wind  which  blows  good  to 
nobody,"  and,  truth  to^tell,  certain  men  made  towering 
reputations  out  of  the  savage  warfare. 

There  was  a  hot  fight  as  to  who  should  open  for  the 
Single  Gold  Standardists.  Isador  Rayner,  of  Maryland, 
eloquent,  learned,  and  enthusiastic,  subsequently  United 
States  Senator,  who  attained  wide  and  enduring  celebrity 
as  counsel-in-chief  for  Admiral  Winfield  Scott  Schley, 
won.  Rayner  was  of  Jewish  extraction  and  stands  sec- 
ond only  to  Judah  P.  Benjamin,  of  Louisiana,  in  point  of 
ability  and  reputation  among  the  half-dozen  Israelitish  Sen- 
ators— the  four  others  being  Yulee  of  Florida,  Jonas  of 
Louisiana,  Simon  of  Oregon,  and  Guggenheim  of  Colorado. 

There  was  no  squabble  among  the  Silver  men  as  to 
who  should  lead.  All  eyes  and  hearts  turned  to  the  great 
Missourian,  Richard  Parks  Bland,  who  had  devoted  years 
to  the  cause  and  was  named  "Silver  Dick"  the  wide 
world  around.  In  very  truth  "Where  MacGregor  sat 
was  the  head  of  the  table."  No  truer  or  braver  soul  ever 
led  a  forlorn  hope.  He  did  not  belong  to  the  school  of 
Demosthenes,  Cicero,  and  Patrick  Henry.  He  indulged 
in  no  frills  of  oratory.  He  possessed  the  power  of  lumi- 
nous statement  in  an  unusual  degree.  He  knew  more 
about  the  history  and  philosophy  of  the  precious  metals 
than  any  other  American.  Born  in  Kentucky,  he  came 
of  Revolutionary  Virginia  stock,  one  of  his  ancestors  being 
a  signer  of  the  Declaration  and  bosom  friend  of  Washing- 
ton. In  his  youth  he  had  been  an  Indian-fighter  on  the 
frontier,  and  amid  the  splendors  of  Washington  retained 
the  rural  manners  and  simple  tastes  of  his  earlier  years. . 
His  speech  on  that  momentous  day — dies  irce — was  an 
epoch-maker  and  came  to  be  known  as  "The  Parting  of 


324  MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

the  Ways  Speech.*'  It  did  not  achieve  success  for  the 
cause  so  close  to  his  heart,  but  it  did  secure  for  his  name 
the  first  place  in  the  presidential  black-Hst. 

In  ordinary  fairness  to  Mr.  Cleveland  it  should  be 
stated  that  in  the  matter  of  gold  and  silver  coinage  he 
never  pretended  to  be  that  which  he  was  not.  He  never 
was  for  the  free  and  unlimited  coinage  of  silver  at  sixteen 
to  one,  and  never  claimed  to  be.  The  majority  of  Demo- 
crats were  in  favor  of  it.  It  is  unaccountable  on  any 
grounds  of  reason  that  the  Democratic  leaders,  knowing 
the  sentiment  of  the  Democratic  masses  on  that  subject, 
as  well  as  Mr.  Cleveland's,  nominated  him  and  then 
claimed  throughout  the  campaign,  through  some  sort  of 
self-deception,  that  he  was  a  bimetallist — which  he  was 
not  any  more  than  he  was  a  Mohammedan.  They  cer- 
tainly should  have  known  his  opinion,  and,  what  is  more, 
they  knew  he  was  firm  even  unto  stubbornness. 

At  Hannibal,  Missouri,  in  that  campaign,  I  heard 
Senator  George  Graham  Vest,  who  favored  the  free  and 
unlimited  coinage  of  silver  and  gold  at  sixteen  to  one, 
who  was  an  honest  man  as  well  as  a  very  able  and  brilliant 
one,  state  to  a  great  audience  that  the  only  difference 
between  Mr.  Cleveland  and  himself  on  the  Silver  question 
was  as  to  the  ratio.  The  Senator  first  deceived  himself, 
and  then  unintentionally  deceived  his  audience.  So  did 
other  Democratic  orators.  Two  queries  force  themselves 
on  students  and  casuists:  i.  Why,  being  in  favor  of  the 
Single  Gold  Standard,  and  knowing  full  well  that  the 
Democratic  masses  were  in  favor  of  the  free  and  unlimited 
coinage  of  both  silver  and  gold,  and  knowing  also  that  they 
believed  that  the  Chicago  platform  declared  for  that  very 
thing,  did  Mr.  Cleveland  accept  a  nomination  on  that 
platform?  2.  Having  been  elected  on  it,  knowing  how 
Democrats  construed  it,  was  it  or  was  it  not  his  duty  to 
submerge  his  own  personal  opiniori  and  carry  oijt  the  will 
pf  thpse  whp  fkcted  him? 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  325 

After  the  Silver  fight  at  the  extra  session,  the  Demo- 
crats in  the  House  and  Senate  were  divided  into  two 
implacable  factions.  There  was  a  brigade  of  Confederate 
Kentuckians  called  "The  Orphan  Brigade/'  because  two 
of  its  commanders  were  killed  in  battle.  After  the  Silver 
fight,  the  Fifty- third  Congress  might  well  have  been 
dubbed  "The  Orphan  Congress."  The  first-fruits  of  the 
Silver  feud  was  that  there  were  scarcely  enough  Demo- 
crats elected  to  the  House  of  the  Fifty-fourth  Congress 
to  call  the  ayes  and  nays.  It  was  the  greatest  slaughter  of 
innocents  since  the  days  of  King  Herod. 

It  was  a  great  debate.  Divers  notable  speeches  were 
made.  One  man,  Lafe  Pence,  of  Colorado,  made  a 
national  reputation  on  the  fourth  day  of  his  service  in 
the  House.  He  was  one  of  the  victims  of  the  landslide  of 
1894,  and  never  regained  his  political  footing. 

While  almost  every  member  made  a  speech,  short  or 
long,  or  printed  one  in  The  Congressional  Record,  the 
principal  Speakers  for  Silver  were  Bland,  Pence,  Sibley, 
and  Bryan,  and  the  chief  Speakers  against  it  were  William 
L.  Wilson,  Rayner,  Cochran,  and  Reed. 

Taken  all  in  all,  it  may  be  fairly  ranked  as  among  the 
great  Congressional  debates. 

Mr.  Cleveland  was  so  thoroughly  against  Silver  that 
he  even  vetoed  the  little  bill  for  the  coinage  of  the  "senior- 
age,"  though  begged  to  sign  it  by  many  of  his  Democratic 
supporters  on  the  Repeal  bill  almost  with  tears  in  their 
eyes,  explaining  to  him  that  it  would  save  them  from  their 
wrathy  constituents;  but  having  used  them  to  their  un- 
doing, he  threw  them  to  the  wolves.  Among  them  were 
such  prominent  men  as  Senator  Daniel  W.  Voorhees  and 
Representative  William  D.  Bynum,  both  of  Indiana, 
William  L.  Wilson,  of  West  Virginia,  General  Outhwaite, 
of  Ohio,  Clifton  R.  Breckenridge^  of  Arkansas,  and  others 
of  high  standing  in  House  or  Senate. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  Fifty-second  Congress,  Mr, 


326   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Speaker  Crisp,  acting  under  a  species  of  duress,  appointed 
Judge  William  M.  Springer,  of  Illinois,  chairman  of  the 
Committee  on  Ways  and  Means,  because,  as  heretofore 
stated,  at  the  psychological  moment  Springer  threw  his 
little  bunch  of  supporters  for  the  Speakership  to  Charles 
Frederick  Crisp,  thereby  giving  the  nomination  to  the 
Georgian.  Springer,  as  chairman  of  Ways  and  Means, 
was  much  ridiculed  for  his  "pop-gun  tariff  bills" — that 
is,  instead  of  introducing  one  general  bill  revising  all  the 
schedules,  he  introduced  a  separate  bill  for  each  schedule. 
Great  sport  was  had  at  his  expense,  but  it  has  never  been 
settled  definitely  that  Springer's  derided  plan  was  not 
as  good  as  any  other.  The  chances  are  that  his  fussy 
manner  had  as  much  to  do  in  provoking  the  jests  as  did 
the  ** pop-gun  bills'*  themselves.  In  confirmation  of 
this  view  it  will  be  remembered  that  in  the  Sixty-second 
Congress  Mr.  Chairman  Underwood  introduced  particu- 
lar bills  for  particular  schedules,  beginning  with  "Sched- 
ule K" — the  wool  schedule.  Underwood's  bills  were  as 
truly  "pop-gun  bills"  as  were  Springer's.  Nobody  vent- 
ured to  ridicule  Underwood  or  his  bills,  because  that 
able,  suave,  sedate,  and  level-headed  statesman  does  not 
invite  ridicule;  and  what  is  a  good  deal  more,  it  was  widely 
known  that  he  carried  a  fist  of  steel  in  a  velvet  glove. 
Watching  him  in  action,  a  person  realizes  that  "a  man 
may  smile  and  smile  and  be  a  fighter."  Consequently, 
his  opponents  were  chary  of  trying  any  funny  business 
with  him.  A  bit  of  contemporaneous  history  vindicates 
Judge  Springer  and  his  pop-gun  bills.  Our  Republican 
friends  in  this  (the  Sixty-sixth)  Congress  are  bringing  in 
separate  bills  for  separate  items.  They  are  the  suc- 
cessors of  the  men  who  poked  so  much  fun  at  Springer's 
pop-gun  bills. 

The  arrangement  with  Springer  appears  not  to  have 
been  a  continuing  one.  As  Crisp  had  no  opposition 
among  Democrats  for  his  second  term  as  Speaker,  he  was 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  327 

hands-free  in  making  up  his  committees,  and  promptly 
appointed  WilHam  L.  Wilson,  of  West  Virginia,  chairman 
of  the  Ways  and  Means,  thereby  ipso  facto  making  him 
Democratic  floor  leader,  at  the  same  time  demoting 
Springer  to  the  chairmanship  of  Indian  Affairs — ^which 
was  a  severe  jolt  for  the  veteran  Illinoisan. 

It  was  rumored,  and  to  some  extent  believed,  that  Presi- 
dent Cleveland  demanded  of  Mr.  Crisp  Wilson's  appoint- 
ment as  a  condition  precedent  to  his  not  setting  up  a 
candidate  of  his  own  for  the  Speakership  in  opposition  to 
Crisp.  Whether  that  be  true  or  whether  Crisp  himself 
preferred  Wilson  will  never  be  known  unless  Cleveland 
or  Crisp  left  data  on  the  subject  yet  unpublished — which 
probably  they  did  not.  My  own  opinion  is  that  the 
story  is  apocryphal,  for  Mr.  Speaker  Crisp  was  as 
much  a  man  of  his  own  head  as  was  Mr.  Cleveland. 
Individually  I  have  never  believed  that  rumor  for^the  all- 
sufficient  reason  that  Mr.  Speaker  Crisp  was  stronger  in 
the  House  than  was  President  Cleveland,  and  could  have 
been  re-elected  in  spite  of  the  President,  even  had  the 
President  desired  to  defeat  him,  of  which  there  is  no 
evidence. 

At  any  rate,  the  West  Virginian  secured  the  greatly 
coveted  prize,  and  instead  of  being  called  to  take  a  higher 
seat — as  was  a  certain  man  mentioned  in  the  Bible — Judge 
Springer  was  called  to  take  a  lower  seat  at  the  feast.  He 
made  no  outcry  and  did  not  complain — certainly  not  in 
public — but  proceeded  to  discharge  the  duties  of  his  new 
chairmanship  faithfully  and  well,  making,  as  usual,  fre- 
quent speeches.  He  was  a  man  of  wide  information,  a 
useful  legislator,  and  of  perfect  integrity. 

The  vexed  and  vexing  Silver  question  having  been 
disposed  of  at  the  extra  session,  the  Federal  Election  laws 
repealed,  and  the  committees  appointed,  the  decks  were 
cleared  at  the  regular  session  for  the  Tariff  bill — the 
reform  of  the  tariff  being  the  main  thing  for  which  it  was 


328   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

supposed  that  Mr.  Cleveland  and  a  Democratic  Congress 
were  elected. 

The  tariff  question,  like  the  poor,  we  have  with  us 
always.  Promptly  Mr.  Wilson  introduced  his  bill  and 
it  was  reported  as  soon  as  the  House  convened  after  the 
Christmas  holidays.  A  protracted,  angry,  and  somewhat 
futile  debate  ensued.  Every  section,  every  item,  every 
line  was  discussed  ad  libitum — many  of  them  ad  nauseam. 
All  the  arguments  ever  used,  from  the  building  of  the  great 
Chinese  wall  and  the  tariff  system  of  Augustus  Caesar, 
were  brought  forth,  revamped,  and  reburnished — all  the 
heavy  and  bearded  anecdotes,  from  Epictetus  and  iEsop 
to  Mark  Twain  and  Bill  Nye,  were  resurrected  from  their 
tombs  "to  point  a  moral  or  adorn  a  tale." 

Of  course  Mr.  Wilson  was  the  principal  debater  on  his 
side,  but  he  was  aided  powerfully  by  the  Democrats  of 
his  committee — Benton  McMillan,  of  Tennessee,  since 
Governor  of  his  state  and  envoy  extraordinary  and 
minister  plenipotentiary  to  Peru;  Henry  G.  Turner,  of 
Georgia,  one  of  the  most  incisive  speakers  in  the  House; 
WilHam  Bourke  Cockran,  of  New  York;  Williamjennings 
Bryan,  of  Nebraska;  John  C.  Tarsney,  of  Missouri;  CHfton 
R.  Breckinridge,  of  Arkansas,  subsequently  ambassador 
to  St.  Petersburg,  and  others  not  of  the  committee. 

On  the  other  side  were  the  leviathan  of  RepubHcans — • 
Thomas  Brackett  Reed,  of  Maine;  John  Dalzell,  of  Penn- 
sylvania, one  of  the  ablest  men  the  Keystone  State  ever 
sent  to  Congress;  Julius  Caesar  Burrows,  of  Michigan, 
subsequently  and  for  many  years  a  United  States  Senator, 
with  a  voice  like  an  ^olian  harp;  Gen.  Charles  Henry 
Grosvenor,  one  of  the  toughest  debaters  in  the  land; 
Jonathan  P.  Dolliver,  of  Iowa,  subsequently  a  United 
States  Senator,  endowed  with  abundant  oratorical  gifts; 
Samuel  Walker  McCall,  afterward  Governor  of  Massa- 
chusetts, "a  scholar  in  politics";  Gov.  Nelson  Dingley, 
of  Maine,  whose  hea4  was  filled  to  bursting  with  facts. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  329 

the  predestined  father  of  the  "Dingley  Tariff  bill"; 
Sereno  E.  Payne,  of  New  York,  a  splendid  man,  author 
of  the  Payne  Tariff  bill;  Joseph  H.  Walker,  of  Massa- 
chusetts, a  handsome  old  gentleman  possessed  of  vast 
information  and  a  dreadful  temper;  Col.  WiUiam  Peters 
Hepburn,  a  powerful  speaker;  and  others,  as  the  sale 
bills  run,  "too  tedious  to  mention."  Twas  a  battle  royal 
and  ran  for  many  weeks.  As  it  passed  the  House  it  was 
a  fairly  good  bill  from  the  viewpoint  of  a  man  honestly 
in  favor  of  a  tariff  for  revenue — but  what  the  Senate  did 
to  it  was  something  awful. 

I  participated  somewhat  in  that  debate,  and  my  expe- 
rience may  help  young  Representatives  get  a  foothold. 

In  the  Silver  debate  I  was  compelled  to  speak  at  night 
or  not  at  all — a  very  unsatisfactory  performance.  If  a 
man  is  any  sort  of  a  judge  of  his  own  speeches,  I  pro- 
nounce the  one  on  Silver  among  the  best  speeches  I  have 
ever  made  in  Congress.  But  there  were  few  members 
present — that's  always  the  case  at  night,  except  in  the 
closing  days  of  a  session — and  only  one  man  in  the  Press 
gallery.  A  great  many  persons  do  not  know  it,  but  the 
Press  gallery  gives  Representatives  the  big  end  of  their 
reputations,  and  the  members  of  the  Press  gallery  rarely 
attend  at  night.  Worse  still,  it  was  Saturday  night,  and, 
so  far  as  receiving  any  considerable  notice  of  a  speech  is 
concerned,  Saturday  is  the  worst  day  in  the  week  to 
make  it,  because  the  Sunday  papers  are  crowded  with 
other  things.  So  I  determined  that  I  would  not  speak 
at  night  on  the  tariff — a  subject  touching  which  I  knew 
more  than  any  other  subject. 

I  had  learned  enough  of  House  procedure  to  know  that 
the  seventeen  members  of  the  committee  would  speak 
without  limit — ^which  meant  at  least  two  hours  each  on 
the  average,  and  that  old  members  generally  would  be 
treated  liberally  in  the  matter  of  time. 

I  felt  Vender  compulsion  to  speak  on  the  Tariff  bill,  tQ 


330   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

save  my  bacon  at  home.  The  truth  is  that  I  made  more 
speeches  in  my  first  Congress  than  in  any  two  subsequent 
Congresses,  and  for  this  reason:  During  my  long-drawn- 
out  and  bitter  contest  with  Colonel  Norton  for  the  nomi- 
nation, as  heretofore  set  forth,  among  other  things  I 
charged  that  he  had  not  taken  as  active  a  part  in  the 
proceedings  as  he  should  have  done.  His  reply  was  that 
a  new  member  was  compelled  to  take  a  back  seat  for  two 
terms.  Otherwise  the  veteran  members  would  make  it 
so  hot  for  him  that  it  would  do  him  much  harm.  I 
countered  on  that,  with  the  rash  declaration  that  some 
men  were  created  to  occupy  back  seats,  but  that  if  a  man 
had  in  him  the  stuff  out  of  which  statesmen  were  made 
he  could  go  to  the  front  whenever  he  got  ready!  That 
tickled  the  audiences,  but  was  a  source  of  trouble  sub- 
sequently, for  if  I  did  not  make  good  on  that  extravagant 
assertion,  Norton's  friends  would  make  my  life  miserable 
and  probably  defeat  me  for  renomination.  It  will  be 
remembered  that  it  was  painfully  close  betwixt  him  and 
me  in  1892.  In  the  mean  time  some  men  who  supported 
me  that  year,  disappointed  as  to  securing  offices,  had 
turned  against  me,  so  that  my  situation  was  decidedly 
critical. 

Consequently,  being  determined  to  express  my  views 
on  the  tariff  in  the  daytime  and  at  length,  I  made  up  my 
mind  to  speak  all  I  desired  under  the  five-minutes  rule 
— the  best  rule  on  the  subject  of  speechmaking  ever  de- 
vised by  the  wit  of  man.  You  cannot,  in  the  very  nature 
of  the  case,  have  an  exordium  or  a  peroration  to  a  five- 
minute  speech.  You  must  seize  the  subject  in  the  middle 
and  cram  as  much  of  thought  as  possible  into  that  brief 
period.  It  might  well  be  called  a  condenser  of  language. 
Moreover,  it  is  an  elastic  rule,  and  except  in  the  rush  days 
at  the  close  of  a  session,  when  time  is  more  precious  than 
rubies,  if  a  member  is  making  a  good  five  minutes'  speech 
he  can  usually  secure  an  extension  for  another  five  min- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  331 

utes,  perhaps  more.  There  is  this  advantage  for  a  mem- 
ber speaking  under  the  five-minutes  rule  instead  of  in 
the  general  debate — there  is  almost  certain  to  be  a  larger 
attendance  of  members  of  both  the  House  and  the  Press 
gallery,  especially  if  the  bill  is  of  any  considerable 
importance. 

Having  discovered  these  facts,  I  carefully,  studiously, 
and  laboriously  prepared  the  best  and  strongest  tariff 
speech  that  I  could  write — an  hour  and  a  quarter  long — 
rewrote  it,  polished  it  up,  boiled  it  down,  cut  it  into  five- 
minutes  sections,  and  committed  it  thoroughly  to  mem- 
ory. I  did  not  ask  the  managers  for  time  in  the  general 
debate,  but  patiently  waited  for  the  five-minutes  dis- 
cussion to  begin.  Then  I  went  in.  Here  is  what  hap- 
pened: One  day  I  spoke  five  minutes  and  quit;  another 
day  I  spoke  ten,  my  time  being  extended  once;  another 
day  I  spoke  fifteen;  another  day  twenty;  and  the  last 
day  I  spoke  thirty-five  minutes  under  the  five-minutes 
rule.  Then  I  got  together  the  various  parts  and  printed 
them  as  one  speech. 

From  that  day  to  this  I  have  never  had  any  trouble 
getting  all  the  time  I  wanted — perhaps  more  than  was 
good  for  me. 

One  of  the  big  questions  in  the  construction  of  that 
Tariff  bill  was  whether  it  should  contain  an  income-tax 
provision.  The  Democratic  members  of  the  Committee 
on  Ways  and  Means  decided  that  it  should,  but  not 
unanimously,  for  WilHam  Bourke  Cockran,  a  Democratic 
member  of  that  committee,  famous  as  an  orator,  led  the 
fight  against  it  and  made  a  terrific  onslaught  upon  it — 
very  much  to  the  disgust  of  the  Democratic  brethren. 
His  speech  against  the  income  tax  somewhat  dimmed  the 
glory  of  his  speech  a  few  weeks  before,  in  favor  of  the 
Wilson  Tariff  bill  proper,  which  set  the  House  on  its 
head  and  which  so  thrilled  the  giant  Senator  Coke  of 
Texas  that  he  took  Cockran  in  his  mighty  arms  on  the 


332   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

floor  of  the  House  and  hugged  him  as  though  the  brilliant 
New-Yorker  had  been  a  baby.  Some  sensational  news- 
paper man  declared  that  Coke  kissed  Cockran,  but  that 
was  a  pleasant  fantasy. 

The  embrace  which  Coke  bestowed  upon  Cockran  was 
the  most  spectacular  feature  of  that  debate,  except  when 
Harry  St.  George  Tucker  and  W.  J.  Bryan  carried  Mr. 
Chairman  William  L.  Wilson  out  of  the  hall  on  their 
shoulders,  as  heretofore  described.  It  was  noticed,  how- 
ever, that  nobody  embraced  Cockran  when  he  finished 
his  anti-income-tax  speech.  Notwithstanding  the  op- 
position of  Cockran  and  others,  we  incorporated  the 
income  tax  in  the  Tariff  bill.  Though  the  Senate  cut 
and  carved  the  Wilson  Tariff  bill  in  a  most  cruel  way,  it 
left  the  income-tax  feature  in  it.  So  it  became  the  law 
of  the  land — destined  to  be  killed  by  a  five-to-four  decision 
of  the  Supreme  Court — which  decision,  under  the  peculiar 
and  suspicious  circumstances  under  which  it  was  rendered, 
became  a  stench  in  the  nostrils  of  all  decent  people.  The 
opponents  of  the  income  tax  claimed  that  it  was  uncon- 
stitutional. It  was  decided  at  the  first  hearing  by  a 
bench  of  eight  judges — four  for  and  four  against  its  con- 
svitutionality — Mr.  Justice  Shiras  voting  for  its  constitu- 
tionality. Of  course  the  tie-vote  left  the  income  tax  in 
full  force  and  effect.  Mr.  Justice  Jackson,  of  Tennes- 
see, was  at  home  suffering  from  what  proved  to  be  his 
last  sickness.  Because  he  was  originally  a  Whig  and  had 
been  appointed  to  the  Supreme  Court  bench  by  a  Republi- 
can President,  Gen.  Benjamin  Harrison,  the  opponents 
of  the  income  tax  erroneously  concluded  that  were  he 
present  he  would  cast  his  vote  against  the  constitutionality 
of  the  income  tax — thereby  making  a  majority  against  it. 
So  they  moved  for  a  rehearing  and  secured  it.  Mr. 
Justice  Jackson  came  to  Washington  with  the  seal  of 
death  upon  his  face,  thereby  making  a  full  bench  of  nine. 
The  rehearing  was  had  in  due  course.    When  the  de- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  333 

cision  was  rendered  by  the  full  bench,  there  were  two 
surprises:  Mr.  Justice  Jackson  had  voted  to  sustain  the 
constitutionality,  and  Mr.  Justice  Shiras  had  flopped  to 
the  opponents  of  the  income  tax,  and  therefore  by  a  vote 
of  five  to  four  the  income  tax  was  held  to  be  unconstitu- 
tional, null,  and  void. 

It  immediately  became  part  of  the  Democratic  creed, 
but  it  was  not  again  placed  upon  the  statute-book  until  a 
constitutional  amendment  was  adopted  authorizing  Con- 
gress to  levy  an  income  tax. 

By  an  interesting  coincidence  three  great  Tennesseeans 
figure  most  conspicuously  in  the  income-tax  legislation: 
Benton  McMillan  was  author  of  the  income-tax  provision 
of  the  Wilson  Tariff  bill,  Mr.  Justice  Jackson  voted  with 
almost  his  last  breath  to  sustain  its  constitutionality, 
and  Cordell  Hull  is  father  of  the  present  income-tax  law, 
part  of  the  Underwood  bill,  most  assuredly  a  proud 
record  for  the  Old  Volunteer  State. 

Democratic  opinion  in  the  House  on  the  tariff  ranged 
all  the  way  from  Beltshoover  of  Pennsylvania  and  cer- 
tain other  members  who  were  as  much  high  protectionists 
as  Reed,  Dingley,  Burrows,  and  Payne  to  out-and-out 
free-traders,  Tom  L.  Johnson,  WiUiam  Bourke  Cockran, 
and  John  DeWitt  Warner  being  the  leading  lights  in  that 
small  but  select  company.  The  extremists  at  both  ends 
of  the  line  gave  Chairman  Wilson  much  trouble,  but  the 
bulk  of  the  Democrats  supported  him  loyally  on  most 
items  of  the  bill.  What  he  and  they  wanted  was  to  enact 
a  tariff  law  which  would  raise  sufficient  revenue,  dis- 
tributing the  burden  as  evenly  as  possible.  He  found 
the  road  to  a  tariff  for  revenue  only  as  hard  as  the  Jordan 
Road  to  travel.  Out  of  it  all,  with  unfailing  courtesy 
and  patience  equal  to  Job's,  he  got  a  bill  which  measurably 
complied  with  Democratic  desire  and  expectation.  Had 
his  bill  become  a  law,  and  had  it  become  a  law  early 
enough  for  people  to  appreciate  its  workings,  niany  of 


334   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

the  Democratic  Congressional  victims  of  the  landslide  in 
1894  would  have  been  re-elected — perhaps  enough  to  have 
controlled  the  House  of  the  Fifty-fourth  Congress;  but 
alack  and  alas!  the  Senate,  which  was  Democratic  nomi- 
nally by  the  narrowest  of  margins — really  non-Demo- 
cratic— changed  it  for  the  worse  in  almost  every  feature, 
and,  what  was  more  disastrous,  the  Senate  did  not  pass 
any  bill  at  all  until  late  in  August,  while  the  business  of 
the  country  was  going  to  the  dogs  by  reason  of  the 
uncertainty  of  what  would  be  in  the  bill  when  it  became 
a  law.  Doctor  Johnson  said  in  his  famous  epitaph  on 
Goldsmith  that  "he  touched  nothing  that  he  did  not 
adorn,"  so  it  may  be  truly  said  that  the  Senate  touched 
no  part  of  the  Wilson  Tariff  bill  that  it  did  not  injure — 
from  the  standpoint  of  men  who  believed  in  a  tariff  for 
revenue. 

At  that  time  a  full  Senate  consisted  of  eighty-eight  mem- 
bers, but  there  were  three  vacancies,  and  so  the  Senate 
stood  forty-four  Democrats,  thirty-eight  Republicans,  and 
three  Farmers'  Alliance  men.  The  Democrats  had  a 
majority  of  only  three  in  the  Senate,  and  could  also  rely 
on  the  vote  of  Vice-President  Stevenson.  Consequently, 
about  all  a  Senator,  particularly  a  Democratic  Senator, 
had  to  do  to  raise  the  tariff  on  any  item  in  which  he  or 
his  constituents  had  an  interest  was  to  make  his  demand 
coupled  with  a  threat,  veiled  or  unveiled,  that  if  he  did 
not  secure  all  he  wanted  he  would  vote  against  the  bill. 
The  leaders  in  that  sort  of  work  were  Senator  David 
Bennett  Hill,  of  New  York,  and  Senator  Arthur  Pue 
Gorman,  of  Maryland,  two  of  the  most  astute  of  mortals 
and  among  the  most  skilful  of  politicians.  They  were 
men  of  great  experience  in  public  affairs.  Hill  having  been 
mayor  of  Elmira,  a  member  of  the  Legislature,  Lieuten- 
ant-Governor and  Governor  for  three  terms,  as  well  as  a 
strong  contender  for  the  presidential  nomination.  He 
was  a  disciple  of  Samuel  J.  Tilden,  who  was  a  disciple  of 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  335 

Martin  Van  Buren,  who  was  a  disciple  of  Aaron  Burr. 
Senator  Gorman  had  been  a  United  States  Senator  for 
many  years,  besides  having  held  many  minor  offices  in 
state  and  nation.  He  had  been  in  politics  all  his  life, 
beginning  as  a  Senate  page — a  position  secured  through 
the  kindness  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  one  of  the  greatest 
men  of  his  time,  and  who  has  received  a  very  cold  deal 
in  history.  Being  very  prominent  in  the  national  com- 
mittee in  1884,  Gorman  was  accorded  the  lion's  share 
of  the  credit  for  Cleveland's  first  election,  but  subse- 
quently their  relations  became  badly  strained — a  fact 
pregnant  with  woe  for  Democrats.  Most  Democrats  had 
a  warm  place  in  their  hearts  for  Gorman — especially 
Southern  Democrats — because  they  believed  that  he,  more 
than  any  other  man,  had  defeated  the  Force  bill — which 
they  both  hated  and  dreaded.  He  was  generally  con- 
sidered of  presidential  stature.  In  1894  Gorman  was 
one  of  the  three  handsomest  men  I  ever  saw.  He  had 
a  Greek  head  and  face,  and  his  mind  had  all  the  sinuosi- 
ties of  the  Greek  intellect.  He  was  in  the  prime  of  manly 
beauty,  at  the  zenith  of  influence  and  fame.  He  was 
universally  regarded  as  the  tactician  and  strategist-in- 
chief  of  the  Senate  Democrats.  While  not  an  orator,  he 
was  a  forceful  speaker  and  a  masterful  organizer  of  men. 
In  Maryland  he  was  supreme.  His  discomfited  enemies 
dubbed  him  "Boss''  and  charged  him  with  being  the 
owner  and  operator  of  a  machine  which  he  ran  with  utter 
ruthlessness;  but  he  pursued  the  even  tenor  of  his  way 
unruffled  by  their  rancor  and  abuse — bland,  courteous, 
kind,  successful. 

Hill  was  new  to  the  Senate,  but  a  veteran  in  politics. 
He  was  referred  to  as  a  possible,  even  a  probable.  Presi- 
dent. These  two  men — Gorman  and  Hill — ^joined  hands 
to  remodel  the  Wilson  bill  to  suit  their  fancy — both 
animated  by  a  cordial  dislike  of  President  Cleveland. 
Ranged  with  them  were  Senator  Murphy  of  Troy,  New 


336   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

York,  whose  specialty  as  to  tariff  matters  was  collars 
and  cuffs — ^whom  President  Cleveland  had  endeavored 
to  have  defeated  for  the  Senate — and  Senator  James 
Smith,  Jr.,  of  Newark,  New  Jersey,  a  city  with  more 
sorts  of  manufacturing  industries  than  any  other  city 
in  America.  Senator  Smith  was  rated  as  a  millionaire 
manufacturer  of  patent  leather,  was  engaged  in  several 
other  kinds  of  business,  employing  hundreds  of  men,  and 
enjoyed  the  reputation  of  being  generous  to  his  employees 
and  a  public-spirited  citizen.  Senator  Calvin  S.  Brice, 
of  Ohio,  and  the  Louisiana  Senators  generally  co-oper- 
ated with  Gorman,  Hill,  Smith,  and  Murphy. 

Parenthetically  I  saw  and  heard  Senator  Gorman  on 
one  occasion,  when  his  conduct  and  words  convinced  me 
— by  subsequent  reflection — that  he  was  an  exceedingly 
wise  man. 

While  the  war  with  Spain  was  brewing,  every  few  days 
some  House  Democrat  would  move,  or  try  to  move,  to 
recognize  the  Cuban  Republic,  or  something  of  the  sort. 
One  morning  we  lacked  only  thirty-four  votes  of  succeed- 
ing. Many  Republicans  were  growing  restless  and  un- 
easy— and  in  increasing  numbers.  After  the  vote  was 
taken  certain  Republicans  came  to  us  and  said  that 
unless  President  McKinley  did  thus  and  so  in  a  week 
eighteen  of  them  at  least  would  vote  with  us,  which 
would  have  given  us  one  majority.  Such  a  definite 
proposition  as  that  on  such  a  serious  subject  could  not 
be  ignored.  Somebody  carried  the  news  over  to  the 
Senate.  Just  as  the  House  was  adjourning  that  evening 
a  Senate  page  ran  in  and  told  Joseph  Weldon  Bailey,  of 
Texas,  Democratic  House  leader,  that  the  Democratic 
Senators  on  the  Committee  on  Foreign  Relations  were 
having  a  meeting  in  the  rooms  of  Senator  Jones  of 
Arkansas,  and  for  him  to  come  over  with  the  Democratic 
members  of  the  House  Committee  on  Foreign  Affairs, 
and  any  other  Democratic  members  he  desired.     Twenty- 


AMERICAN    POLITCIS  357 

five  Democratic  Senators  and  Representatives  met 
together  for  consultation  on  the  important  question  as 
to  whether  the  House  Democrats  should  join  with  the 
disgruntled  House  Republicans  and  pass  a  resolution 
recognizing  the  Cuban  Republic — ^which  meant  war. 
Senator  Gorman  presided  informally.  Of  the  twenty- 
five  men  present  twenty-two  were  unqualifiedly  in  favor 
of  the  aUiance,  one  was  on  the  fence,  and  Gen.  Francis 
Marion  Cockrell,  of  Missouri,  who  fought  valiantly  in 
the  Confederate  Army  for  four  years,  and  who  bore  several 
honorable  scars,  bluntly  and  briefly  declared  that  the 
plan  was  absolutely  nonsensical  and  that  he  was  against  it. 

Gorman  listened  to  us  all,  and  wound  up  the  meeting 
m  these  words:  **I  will  tell  you  gentlemen  what  you  are 
about  to  do.  You  are  going  to  join  hands  with  a  lot  of 
sorehead  Republicans  to  force  a  war  upon  a  President 
who  does  not  want  war — 3.  war  bound  to  be  ended  in  a 
hundred  days  by  the  complete  triumphs  of  American 
arms.  All  the  glory  thereof  will  redound  to  President 
McKinley  and  the  Repubhcan  administration.  People 
will  forget  that  you  Democrats  practically  forced  it,  and 
will  give  you  no  credit.  The  war  will  furnish  the  Presi- 
dent with  ten  thousand  fat  offices  with  which  to  satisfy 
Republicans  heretofore  disappointed  as  to  patronage. 
The  Democratic  party  will  be  effaced  from  the  map,  and 
ril  be  damned  if  I  will  be  a  party  to  any  such  idiocy!'* 
He  hit  the  bulFs-eye,  and  no  mistake.  During  our  six- 
teen years  of  wandering  in  the  wilderness  without  manna 
and  without  quail  1  often  thought  of  that  sententious 
and  prophetic  utterance. 

After  sore  travail  the  Senate  passed  its  bill,  or,  more 
properly  speaking,  passed  the  Wilson  bill  with  several 
hundred  amendments,  and  sent  it  back  to  us.  In  effect 
the  Wilson  bill  had  been  chopped  into  mincemeat.  The 
original  Wilson  bill,  loaded  down  and  disfigured  by  the 
Senate    amendments,    was    turned    over   to   the   tender 

Vol.  I.— 22 


338   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

mercies  of  the  conferees.  They  had  an  unseemly  wrangle 
lasting  many  weeks.  After  much  weary  waiting,  a  con- 
ference report  was  brought  in  which  at  first  the  House, 
under  the  lead  of  Mr.  Chairman  Wilson,  rejected.  More 
conferring — more  wrangling.  Pending  this,  Mr.  Cleve- 
land wrote  his  celebrated  ** Dishonor  and  Party  Perfidy" 
letter  to  Chairman  Wilson,  which  rendered  "confusion 
worse  confounded."  Finally  the  House  surrendered  to 
the  Senate,  "horse,  foot,  and  dragoons,"  and  swallowed 
the  nauseous  mess,  hook,  line,  and  sinker,  most  Democrats 
figuratively  holding  their  noses,  a  few  brave  souls,  such 
as  Tom  L.  Johnson,  voting  against  it.  The  bill  was  sent 
to  the  President,  who  in  high  dudgeon  declined  to  sign  it. 
He  sulked  for  ten  days,  thereby  permitting  it  to  become 
a  law  without  his  signature.  Congress  loafed  during  the 
ten  days  in  order  that  the  bill  might  become  a  law,  for 
if  the  President  did  not  sign  it  and  Congress  adjourned 
before  the  ten  days  expired,  the  bill  would  fail  to  become 
a  law.  Had  Mr.  Cleveland  signed  it  promptly  when 
sent  to  him,  at  least  fifty  Democratic  Representatives 
who  were  defeated  by  narrow  margins — of  whom  I  was 
one — would  have  been  re-elected.  So  soon  as  the  bill 
became  a  law  times  began  to  improve,  and  ten  days 
more  of  improvement  would  have  helped  largely  at  the 
election.  As  it  was,  we  had  to  face  a  people  disheartened 
by  the  panic  and  angry  from  disappointment.  We  had 
to  carry  the  odium  of  the  bad  features  forced  into  the 
bill  in  the  Senate,  and  had  everywhere  to  meet  the  presi- 
dential charge  that  we  had  acted  with  "dishonor  and  party 
perfidy."  The  result  was  inevitable.  The  Repubhcans 
carried  every  close  district  such  as  mine  and  many  which 
in  1890  and  1892  had  given  large  Democratic  majorities. 
They  achieved  a  sweeping  victory,  converting  a  big 
Democratic  majority  in  the  House  of  the  Fifty-third 
Congress  into  a  Republican  majority  of  enormous 
proportions    in    the  House  of  the  Fifty-fourth  Congress. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  339 

The  Senate  was  also  transformed  into  a  Republican  body. 
So,  during  the  last  half  of  his  second  term  Mr.  Cleveland 
**had  on  his  hands  a  Congress"  Republican  in  both 
branches. 

In  the  retrospect,  it  seems  to  me  that,  had  the  President 
and  the  Congress  started  out  deliberately  to  turn  the 
government  back  to  the  Republicans — ^which  of  course 
they  did  not — they  could  not  have  devised  a  plan  better 
than  the  one  pursued. 

It  was  inevitable  that  during  the  short  session  of  the 
Fifty-third  Congress  the  Democrats,  after  such  a  thor- 
ough drubbing,  should  be  sore  and  in  wretched  humor, 
wrangling,  jangling,  snapping,  quarreling  about  anything 
and  everything. 

As  the  Breckenridge-Heard  row  was  the  most  stormy 
scene  that  I  witnessed  in  the  House  during  that  short 
session,  and  as  both  men  were  my  personal  friends,  I 
propose  to  describe  it  exactly  as  I  saw  and  heard  it, 
premising  with  the  statement  that  while  it  was  an  affair 
to  be  regretted  all  round,  Breckinridge  and  Heard  both 
acted  in  such  a  way  as  to  convince  all  men  of  their 
physical  courage  and  good  common  sense. 

It  was  district  day,  and  Heard,  as  chairman  of  the 
District  Committee,  was  entitled  to  the  right  of  way. 
Heard,  as  a  matter  of  courtesy,  yielded  to  Governor 
McCreary  of  Kentucky,  chairman  of  the  Committee  on 
Foreign  Affairs,  to  make  a  conference  report,  not  to  be 
debated  and  to  consume  not  over  twenty  minutes.  But, 
in  submitting  his  report,  Mr.  Chairman  McCreary  made 
a  few  remarks  which  provoked  others  in  reply,  and  thus 
over  an  hour  of  Heard's  committee's  time  was  consumed. 
Others  wanted  to  speak,  among  them  Colonel  W.  C.  P. 
Breckinridge.  In  defense  of  his  committee,  and  on  the 
advice  of  many  leading  members.  Heard  opposed  further 
debate  on  McCreary's  report  and  demanded  the  pre- 
vious questipn,    Whereupon  he  and.  Colonel  Breckenridge 


340   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

got  into  a  conversation  which  constantly  grew  hotter, 
until  both  men  got  mad. 

Heard  exclaimed,  **It  is  better  for  the  House  to  trans- 
act the  necessary  business  of  the  committee  than  to  give 
the  gentleman  an  opportunity  to  make  a  buncombe 
speech." 

Breckinridge  shouted,  "You  are  a  dirty  pup!" 

Heard  replied,  **You  are  a  d d  liar!" 

Then  bedlam  broke  loose.  Every  member  was  on  his 
feet  in  an  instant.  Colonel  Breckinridge  left  his  seat, 
walked  down  the  aisle,  crossed  the  area  in  front  of  the 
Speaker^s  stand,  and  started  up  the  big  aisle  toward 
Heard's  seat.  Colonel  Breckinridge  was  about  five  feet 
ten,  stockily  built,  weighed  about  two  hundred,  was  very 
muscular,  and  not  past  his  prime.  His  full  beard  was 
the  color  of  snow,  and  his  face,  always  rubicund,  was 
flaming  scarlet  that  morning.  He  had  the  finest  head  of 
yellowish-white  hair  in  America,  and  it  floated  in  the 
breeze  like  the  plume  of  Navarre.  Like  a  mad  bull  he 
was  endeavoring  to  get  to  the  Missourian,  who,  slender, 
frail,  and  erect  as  an  Indian,  stood  in  his  place  calmly 
awaiting  the  infuriated  Kentuckian.  Heard  looks  more 
hke  a  Methodist  bishop  and  talks  less  like  one  than  any 
other  man  in  America. 

I  never  knew  what  was  going  through  Heard's  head  at 
that  trying  moment,  but  as  he  evidently  was  no  match 
for  Breckinridge  in  a  slugging-match,  and  as  he  clearly 
meant  to  meet  him,  my  private  opinion  always  has  been, 
and  is  now,  that  he  fully  intended  to  stick  a  knife  into 
his  antagonist  as  soon  as  he  was  close  enough.  Several 
members  interposed.  Speaker  Crisp  was  white  with 
rage,  and  pounded  his  desk  with  his  gavel  so  viciously 
that  the  head  flew  off"  and  hit  the  abdomen  of  a  page,  who 
was  the  only  person  damaged  in  the  flesh.  Crisp  yelled 
for  the  sergeant-at-arms.  It  took  several  minutes  to 
arouse  that  somnolent  official.     In  the  mean  time  the  big 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  341 

aisle  was  a  whirling,  swirling,  howling  mass  of  Congres- 
sional humanity.  Above  the  roar  rose  the  Speaker's 
voice,  shouting:  *'The  sergeant-at-arms  will  arrest  those 
men  and  bring  them  to  the  bar  of  the  House.*' 

At  last  Col.  Ike  Hill  seized  the  mace — his  badge  of 
authority — nicknamed  "the  silver  buzzard"  by  the  irrev- 
erent, and  rushed  up  the  aisle.  The  most  active  man 
he  saw  was  Lafe  Pence,  of  Colorado,  who  was  then  not 
much  bigger  than  Tom  Thumb,  and  who  was  holding, 
like  a  bull-terrier,  one  of  Colonel  Breckinridge's  huge 
arms  and  was  being  flopped  around  in  the  air  by  the 
enraged  Kentuckian.  So  Colonel  Ike  seized  Lafe  and 
dragged  him  down  to  the  bar  of  the  House.  Lafe 
solemnly  swore  he'd  never  act  as  peacemaker  again. 
Finally  Breckinridge  and  Heard  were  led  down  to  the 
Speaker's  stand  and  asked  to  explain  matters. 

Colonel  Breckinridge  then  made  his  statement,  and 
concluded  by  saying:  "The  gentleman  from  Missouri 
should  retract  his  remark,  so  offensive  to  me,  for  that 
cannot  stand  between  the  gentleman  from  Missouri  and 
myself." 

Colonel  Heard  made  his  statement,  which  he  concluded 
as  follows:  "I  simply  did  my  duty  in  the  matter,  which 
gave  offense  to  the  gentleman  from  Kentucky,  and  with- 
out any  purpose  to  slight  him  or  any  other  individual 
member.  He  grossly  insulted  me,  and  by  his  offensive 
remarks  provoked  my  retort,  of  which  he  complains. 
Believing  myself  justified  in  using  the  language  I  did,  I 
will  never  withdraw  nor  qualify  it  until  he  withdraws  that 
which  furnished  the  provocation." 

Thus  it  will  be  seen  that  their  explanations  did  not 
explain,  and  there  were  still  great  gobs  of  blood  on  the » 
moon.  As  everybody  knew  that  both  Heard  and  Breck- 
inridge were  "dead  game,"  a  street  duel  was  expected, 
and  all  were  anxious  to  avert  it.  I  think  the  blessing 
vouchsafed    to    the    peacemakers    in    the    Sermon    on 


342   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

the  Mount  must  forever  rest  on  Alexander  Monroe 
Dockery  and  Judge  Goodnight,  of  Kentucky,  for  that 
day's  work.  Also  on  Colonel  Hatch,  Governor  McCreary, 
Ashur  Caruth,  and  Speaker  Crisp.  They  prevented  a 
shooting-scrape  —  perhaps  a  double  homicide,  i  While 
Breckinridge  and  Heard  went  on  with  their  routine 
duties,  the  above-named  gentlemen  held  peace  confer- 
ences in  the  Speaker's  room,  and,  after  considering  all 
the  facts,  circumstances,  and  language,  it  was  agreed 
that  Mr.  Speaker  Crisp  should  prepare  a  statement  of 
the  matter.  This  he  did  with  such  skill,  friendliness,  and 
judicial  fairness  that  both  the  belHgerents  accepted  it 
like  men  and  without  a  murmur.  In  pursuance  of  the 
arrangement  and  program  effected  by  Speaker  Crisp, 
Dockery,  McCreary,  and  others,  late  in  the  afternoon. 
Colonel  Breckinridge  arose  and  made  a  most  graceful  and 
happy  speech,  "asking  pardon  of  the  House,  including 
the  gentleman .  from  Missouri."  It  was  handsomely 
done,  amid  universal  applause.  Heard  as  handsomely 
responded,  as  generously  retracted,  and  was  as  warmly 
applauded.  At  the  conclusion  of  his  remarks  he  went 
over  to  Breckinridge's  seat,  and  Breckinridge  met  him 
in  the  aisle,  where  they  cordially  shook  hands. 

Heard  said,  **  Billy,  when  men's  beards  get  as  gray  as 
yours  and  mine,  they  ought  to  have  more  sense  than  to 
quarrel  like  boys." 

"Yes,  John,"  replied  Breckinridge,  "but  it  sometimes 
seems  to  me  that  the  grayer  we  get  the  less  sense  we 
have." 

In  this  happy  manner — entirely  honorable  to  both — 
ended  a  decidedly  ugly  quarrel.  Somebody  moved  that 
all  reference  to  the  trouble  be  omitted  from  The  Record^ 
and  it  was  so  ordered.  Thus  Peace  spread  her  white 
wings  over  the  House,  and  all  was  again  lovely  and  serene. 

The  next  day  it  so  happened  that  almost  under  Colonel 
,  Breckinridge's  nose  two  members  were  on  the  verge  ot 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  343 

fisticuffs.  The  venerable  Kentuckian  rose  and,  stretch- 
ing out  his  hands  after  the  fashion  of  Reverend  Doctor 
Chadband  blessing  his  people,  in  dramatic  manner  com- 
manded the  peace.  The  House  broke  into  a  roar  of 
laughter  and  applause,  and  "grim-visaged  War  smoothed 
her  wrinkled  front." 


CHAPTER  XIII 

Gorman,    Cleveland,  Vest,  Harris,  Jones,   Wilson,   Hill,  Breckenridge,   and 
Others — Free  Documents — Pensions. 

DEMOCRATIC  senatorial  leaders  always  claimed 
that  they  secured  by  their  amendments,  not  all  the 
tariff  reform  they  wanted,  but  all  that  was  possible  under 
the  peculiar  circumstances.  Senator  Hill  placed  his  op- 
position to  the  Tariff  bill  avowedly  on  the  ground  of  the 
income-tax  feature.  He  offered,  if  that  were  eliminated, 
to  join  heartily  with  his  brother  Democratic  Senators  in 
making  the  best  tariff  bill  possible,  but  so  long  as  that 
was  retained  he  would  fight  it  to  the  end — and  he  did. 
It  was  retained,  and  he  never  did  vote  for  it.  Hamilcar, 
so  the  histories  relate,  took  his  young  son  Hannibal  and 
made  him  swear,  with  his  hand  on  the  altar,  eternal 
enmity  to  Rome.  From  Senator  Hill's  words  and  acts 
it  may  be  fairly  assumed  that  he  had  sworn  eternal  en- 
mity to  the  income  tax. 

His  defection  reduced  the  Democratic  voting  strength 
on  the  Tariff  bill  in  the  Senate  to  forty-three — precisely 
the  number  required  to  pass  a  bill. 

Cleveland's  friends  claimed  that  Hill's  opposition  to 
the  bill  grew  out  of  his  animosity  to  the  President.  Their 
feud  was  entirely  personal,  and  was  as  bitter  as  that  of 
Blaine  and  ConkHng.  Just  how  it  began  nobody  appears 
to  know.  Here  are  some  admitted  facts  which  throw 
some  light  on  the  vexed  and  vexing  subject. 

In  1882  Cleveland  and  Hill  ran  on  the  same  ticket  for 
Governor  and   Lieutenant-Governor  of  New  York,   re- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  345 

spectively.  Both  were  elected  by  enormous  majorities, 
but  Hill  led  Cleveland  by  about  eight  thousand  votes. 
The  chances  are  that  that  apparently  insignificant  fact, 
little  noted  at  the  time,  planted  in  their  hearts  the  seeds 
of  mutual  hatred.  When  Cleveland  became  President  in 
1885,  Hill  succeeded  him  as  Governor,  and  remained  in 
that  position  by  election  until  the  first  day  of  January, 
1892,  to  take  his  seat  in  the  Senate.  His  term  in  the 
Senate  began  technically  March  4,  1891,  but  he  so  thor- 
oughly detested  the  Lieutenant-Governor,  Jones  (of 
"Jones:  He  pays  the  freight"  fame),  who  would  have 
become  Governor  had  he  resigned  sooner,  that  he  clung 
to  the  governorship  until  his  regularly  elected  successor 
was  inaugurated.  In  1888  Cleveland,  Democratic  nomi- 
nee for  President,  lost  New  York,  and  with  it  the  Presi- 
dency, by  fourteen  thousand  votes,  while  Hill  was  re- 
elected Governor  of  New  York  by  nineteen  thousand 
plurality. 

Thus  was  fuel  added  to  the  flames.  Cleveland's  friends 
loudly  asserted  that  Hill  had  knifed  him,  and  many  ot 
them  beheve  it  to  this  day,  though  Hill  said  repeatedly 
during  the  campaign  that  if  either  he  or  Cleveland  had 
to  be  defeated,  let  it  be  himself. 

In  1892  both  Cleveland,  then  a  private  citizen,  and 
Hill,  a  United  States  Senator,  were  candidates  for  the 
Democratic  presidential  nomination.  The  New  York 
Democratic  State  Committee  called  a  convention  to  meet 
at  Albany  February  22d,  to  select  delegates  to  the 
Chicago  National  Convention,  and  the  delegates  were 
instructed  for  Hill  and  to  vote  under  the  unit  rule.  I 
have  always  thought  that  the  outstanding  feature  of  that 
state  convention  was  that  Governor-Senator  Hill,  in  his 
speech  of  thanks,  quoted  the  opening  Hues  of  Cardinal 
Newman's  famous  hymn,  "Lead,  Kindly  Light,  amid 
the  encircling  gloom,  lead  Thou  me  on!" 

The  Clevelanders  immediately  set  up  the  cry  of  "snap 


346   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

convention"!  And  it  rang  throughout  the  land.  They 
sent  a  contesting  delegation  to  the  national  convention. 
The  members  were  never  seated,  but  they  talked  a  great 
deal,  thereby  ?:ding  materially  in  nominating  Cleveland 
— the  only  man  ever  nominated  for  President  without 
the  vote  of  his  own  state. 

All  men  knew  that  Senator  Hill  was  a  masterful  tac- 
tician, strategist,  and  organizer,  but  nobody  expected 
him  to  become  one  of  the  most  powerful  debaters  in  the 
Senate,  and  yet  that  was  precisely  what  he  did. 

David  B.  Hill  was  one  of  the  most  masterful  politicians 
the  Empire  State  ever  produced.  Being  a  bachelor, 
he  devoted  his  whole  life  to  law  and  politics  in  about 
equal  proportions,  and  succeeded  in  both  fields.  While 
not  an  Apollo  Belvedere,  he  was  a  good-looking  man, 
about  five  feet  seven  or  eight  inches  tall,  weighing  about 
one  hundred  and  sixty-five,  with  jet-black  hair,  mus- 
tache, and  eyes,  and  olive  complexion.  He  was  very 
bald,  which,  strange  to  say,  did  not  make  him  look  old. 
He  was  graceful  in  action,  gracious  in  manner,  with  a 
countenance  of  unusual  shrewdness.  He  was  a  bitter 
fighter,  which  was  demonstrated  when,  after  long  con- 
tests, he  defeated  two  of  Mr.  Cleveland's  New  York 
nominees  for  positions  on  the  Supreme  Bench,  claiming 
boldly  and  bluntly  that  they  were  not  good  Democrats. 
"It's  an  ill  wind  that  blows  good  to  nobody."  President 
Cleveland  grew  weary  of  nominating  New-Yorkers  for 
Senator  Hill  to  butcher,  so  he  nominated  Senator  Edward 
D.  White,  of  Louisiana,  now  the  revered  and  well-beloved 
Chief  Justice  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States. 

During  the  long-drawn-out  fight  on  the  conference  re- 
port on  the  Tariff  bill,  I  witnessed  a  most  thrilling  and 
dramatic  scene  in  the  Senate — a  hot  trial  of  a  question 
of  veracity  betwixt  President  Cleveland  on  the  one  side 
and  Senators  Gorman,  Harris,  Vest,  Jones  of  Arkansas, 
and  Voorhees  on  the  other.     It  came  about  in  this  wise: 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  347 

When  it  became  apparent  that  no  bill  except  the  Senate 
bill  could  be  passed,  Senators  Jones,  Harris,  and  Voor- 
hees  claimed  to  have  interviewed  President  Cleveland 
and  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  Carlisle,  recognized  as 
the  head  tariff  reformer  in  America,  and  to  have  sub- 
mitted the  case  to  them,  and  that  they  both  advised  the 
acceptance  of  the  proposed  Senate  amendments  rather 
than  to  get  no  Tariff  bill  at  all. 

Senator  Vest  did  not  claim  to  have  interviewed  Cleve- 
land, but  vowed  that  he  would  never  have  agreed  to  the 
Senate  amendments  had  he  not  been  assured  that  they 
were  acceptable  to  the  President  and  to  Mr.  Secretary 
Carlisle.  So,  believing  these  men  had  helped  add  the 
Senate  amendments  to  the  House  bill.  On  August  19th 
the  bill  was  still  in  conference.  On  that  day  Mr.  Chair- 
man Wilson  had  read  in  the  House  the  President's  famous 
"Party  Dishonor  and  Perfidy"  letter,  dated  August  2d, 
in  which  hot  shot  was  poured  into  the  Senate  Democrats 
for  placing  in  the  bill  the  Senate  amendments  which  the 
aforementioned  Senators  vehemently  asserted  that  the 
President  and  Secretary  CarHsle  had  agreed  to  accept. 
The  President's  letter,  and  the  claims  of  the  Senators  as 
to  what  he  and  Carlisle  had  said  to  them,  raised  a  ques- 
tion of  veracity.  So  on  August  23d  Senator  Gorman 
delivered  a  most  scathing  and  scorching  speech  about 
the  bad  faith  or  lack  of  veracity  of  the  President.  It 
was  vehement,  caustic,  and  blistering.  In  the  midst  of 
it  he  called  on  Senators  Vest,  Harris,  and  Jones  to  cor- 
roborate his  statements,  which  they  did  promptly  with 
most  astounding  emphasis.  It  was  a  most  remarkable 
performance. 

In  his  speech  the'  great  Marylander  referred  to  Senator 
Hill  as  playing  the  role  of  lago.  The  next  day  Senator 
Hill  gave  this  amusing  and  brilliant  adaptation  of  the 
death  scene  in  "Julius  Caesar" — as  good  use  as  was  made 
of  any  of  the  Shakespeare  plays  in  debate,  equaling  if 


348   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

not  exceeding  the  use  which  both  Hayne  and  Webster 
made  of  " Macbeth  "  in  their  famous  debate.  Senator  Hill 
said:  "Mr.  President,  I  have  thus  discharged  my  duty 
from  my  standpoint.  The  Senator  from  Maryland  yes- 
terday started  to  describe  me  as  the  lago  of  Shakespeare, 
and  then  he  withdrew  the  comparison.  That  reminds 
me  of  the  senatorial  conspiracy  of  years  ago  in  the  Roman 
Senate,  when  a  senatorial  cabal  conspired  to  assassinate 
the  great  Roman  emperor.  If  I  were  disposed  to  make 
comparisons  I  might  speak  of  the  distinguished  Senator 
from  Maryland  as  the  *lean  and  hungry  Cassius.' 
[Laughter.]  You  recollect  what  Caesar  said  of  him. 
He  said,  *He  thinks  too  much;  such  men  are  dangerous.' 
[Laughter.] 

"I  might  speak  of  the  Senator  from  Arkansas  [Mr. 
Jones]  as  Marcus  Brutus — *  honest  Brutus.*  Right  here 
I  want  to  say  a  word.  During  all  the  tariff  debate^  dur- 
ing all  the  preparation  of  this  bill,  that  Senator  has 
exhibited  most  wonderful  patience  and  sagacity;  he  has 
treated  every  citizen  and  every  Senator  with  the  greatest 
respect.  No  matter  how  this  debate  may  terminate,  no 
matter  whether  this  bill  passes  or  not,  1  say  the  Senator 
from  Arkansas— and  in  paying  this  compliment  I  do  not 
discriminate  against  any  one  else — has  won  the  esteem 
and  respect  of  his  countrymen  everywhere.  I  will  call 
him  *  honest  Brutus.'  Cassius  I  have  already  referred  to. 
[Laughter.]  Casca  was  the  distinguished  Senator  who 
struck  the  first  blow  last  Friday  [Mr.  Vest].  Trebonius, 
the  Senator  from  Indiana  [Mr.  Voorhees] — testy,  prob- 
ably a  little  petulant — ^'good  Trebonius.'  Metellus  Cim- 
ber,  the  distinguished  Senator  from  Tennessee  [Mr. 
Harris].     [Laughter.] 

"Mr.  President,  when  yesterday  they  stabbed  at  our 
President  and  sought  to  strike  him  down,  they  made 
the  same  plea  as  did  the  conspirators  of  old,  that  they 
struck  for  Rome — for  their  country.     They  said  they  did 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  349 

it,  not  that  they  loved  Caesar  less,  but  that  they  loved 
Rome  more;  not  that  they  love  their  President  less,  but 
that  they  love  their  party  and  this  Senate  bill  more. 
[Laughter.]     I  can  say  with  Mark  Antony: 


'What  private  griefs  they  have,  alas,  I  know  not, 
That  made  them  do  it;  they  are  wise  and  honorable." 


(Laughter  and  applause  on  the  floor  and  in  the  galleries.) 
Senator  Henry  Cabot  Lodge,  whose  profession,  as 
stated  by  him  in  his  autobiography  in  The  Congressional 
Directory y  is  "Literature,''  is  much  in  the  habit  of  adorn- 
ing his  speeches  with  quotations  from  the  poets.  While 
in  the  House,  in  a  bitterly  contested  election  case  from 
Alabama  he  said,  among  other  things:  "We  have  testi- 
mony, for  instance,  in  the  city  of  Selma,  that  nine  men 
voted  who  were  not  there.  Most  of  them  were  dead. 
We  know,  sir,  on  the  highest  literary  authority  that 


*Tn  the  most  high  and  palmy  state  of  Rome, 
A  little  ere  the  mightiest  Julius  fell, 
The  graves  stood  tenantless,  and  the  sheeted  dead 
Did  squeak  and  gibber  in  the  Roman  streets. 


The  sheeted  dead  did  much  better  than  that  in  Selma, 
Alabama — they  voted.'' 

Farther  along,  commenting  on  the  fact  that  a  man 
named  Elam  was  recorded  as  voting,  though  he  was  mur- 
dered some  months  before,  the  Senator  made  this  pat 
quotation: 

"The  time  has  been 
That  when  the  brains  were  out  the  man  would  die. 
And  there  an  end.     But  now  they  rise  again, 
With  twenty  mortal  murders  on  their  crowns. 
And  push  us  from  our  stools:  This  is  more  strange 
Than  such  a  murder  is.'* 


350   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

WILLIAM    L.  WILSON 

The  French  had  a  confirmed  fashion  of  nicknaming 
their  kings.  Charles  Martel  means  Charles  the  Ham- 
mer; Charlemagne,  Charles  the  Great;  Louis  the  Ninth 
is  always  Saint  Louis;  Louis  the  Fourteenth,  Le  Grand 
Monarque;  Louis  the  Sixteenth,  Louis  the  Locksmith, 
and  Louis  the  Eighteenth,  Louis  the  Hog. 

Then  there  were  Charles  the  Bold,  Charles  the  Fat, 
Charles  the  Mad,  Charles  the  Simple,  Charles  the  Bald, 
Charles  the  Wise,  Charles  the  Victorious,  John  the  Good, 
Philip  the  Fair,  Louis  the  Pious,  and  Louis  the  Lion. 

The  first  of  the  Bonapartes  is  the  "Last  of  the  Caesars,** 
the  "Little  Corporal,"  the  "Man  of  Destiny,'*  and 
"Napoleon  the  Great,**  while  Victor  Hugo,  in  order  to 
even  up  things  in  history  with  Louis  Napoleon  for  the 
butchery  of  December,  whereby  he  overthrew  the  Re- 
public and  estabhshed  the  Second  Empire,  dubbed  him 
"Napoleon  the  Little.** 

Of  all  the  titles  ever  bestowed  upon  a  French  ruler, 
that  most  to  be  desired  is  the  one  given  to  Louis  the  Fif- 
teenth of  "Louis  Bien  Aime** — "Louis  the  Well  Beloved.'* 

WiUiam  L.  Wilson  was  the  well  beloved,  indeed  the 
best  beloved,  in  the  House  of  the  Fifty-third  Congress. 
He  was  chairman  of  the  great  Committee  on  Ways  and 
Means  and  therefore  ex-officio  Democratic  floor  leader. 

If  he  had  an  enemy  on  the  whole  face  of  the  earth,  I 
never  heard  of  it.  I  don*t  see  how  he  could  have.  Brave 
as  a  lion,  he  was  gentle  as  a  woman.  In  his  youth  a  gal- 
lant soldier  of  the  Confederacy,  he  never  alluded  to  that 
bloody  and  heroic  chapter  in  our  annals.  Most  assuredly 
he  did  not  belong  to  that  large  and  constantly  increasing 
army  of  heroes,  "invisible  in  war  and  invincible  in  peace." 
With  fame  world-wide,  he  was  as  unassuming  as  the 
plainest  citizen  of  the  farthest  backwoods. 

With  opportunities  for  growing  rich  beyond  the  dreams 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  351 

of  avarice  by  prostituting  his  high  position  to  personal 
gain,  he  was  still  poor  when  he  died,  and  had  not  Mr. 
Cleveland  taken  him  into  his  official  family,  after  ten 
years  of  most  distinguished  service  in  Congress,  he  would 
have  been  compelled  to  begin  his  law  practice  over  again 
in  the  mountains  of  West  Virginia. 

Since  the  long  agony  of  Garfield,  the  sickness  of  no 
man  has  produced  such  widespread  sympathy  as  that  of 
the  chairman  of  Ways  and  Means.  A  sympathizing 
nation  watched  by  his  bedside  in  spirit  when  he  was  at 
death's  door  in  a  foreign  land.  Since  Blaine  met  his 
Waterloo  in  November,  1884,  the  defeat  of  no  candidate 
has  created  such  universal  sorrow  as  did  Wilson's.  In 
hundreds  of  thousands  of  homes  it  was  not  only  regarded 
as  a  public  calamity,  but  as  a  personal  bereavement. 

Twice  in  his  career  Mr.  Wilson's  experience  has  dem- 
onstrated that  defeat  for  office  is  sometimes  a  blessing  in 
disguise,  as  in  each  instance  he  was  promoted — ^just  as 
the  purblind  politicians  who  gerrymandered  William 
McKinley  out  of  a  seat  in  Congress  helped  considerably 
in  making  him  President. 

Years  ago  Wilson  was  beaten  for  the  nomination  for 
Circuit  judge  by  Charles  James  Faulkner,  afterward 
United  States  Senator  from  West  Virginia.  Soon  after 
that  mishap  he  was  sent  to  Congress.  Had  he  succeeded 
in  securing  a  place  upon  the  woolsack  no  doubt  he  would 
have  made  an  able  and  upright  judge,  but  his  reputation 
would  have  been  circumscribed  to  a  comparatively  small 
area. 

After  the  tariff  barons  boodled  his  district  he  was 
elevated  to  the  Cabinet,  the  most  popular  of  all  Mr. 
Cleveland's  appointments. 

Mr.  Wilson  enjoyed  the  peculiar  distinction  of  being 
a  graduate  of  old  Virginia  University — ^the  great  nursery 
of  Southern  statesmen;  of  having  been  a  professor  in  the 
Columbian  University  at  Washington,  as  well  as  presir 


352   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

dent  of  the  University  of  West  Virginia,  and  of  having 
declined  the  presidency  of  both  the  University  of  Missouri 
and  the  University  of  Texas.  In  this  regard  his  career 
resembles  and  eclipses  those  of  John  Quincy  Adams, 
Edward  Everett,  and  James  A.  Garfield.  After  going  out 
of  the  Cabinet,  he  became  president  of  Washington  and 
Lee  Universit}^,  and  died  in  that  high  position. 

It  would  have  been  nothing  but  fair  for  Missouri  to 
have  taken  Mr.  Wilson  for  her  own,  as  she  has  contributed 
to  West  Virginia's  roll  of  statesmen  two  Governors — ■ 
Jacob  and  MacCorkle — and  four  Senators  of  the  United 
States — Hereford,  Kenna,  Elkins,  and  Sutherland. 

Mr.  Wilson  had  one  of  the  most  wonderful  memories 
ever  possessed  by  any  human  being  since  the  days  of 
Cyrus  the  Great,  who  is  said  to  have  known  the  name  of 
every  man  in  his  vast  armies.  I  do  not  believe  that 
astounding  tale  about  Cyrus.  It  is  too  much  for  human 
creduUty. 

Among  Mr.  Wilson's  most  precious  keepsakes  was  a 
small  gold  watch,  presented  to  him  when  a  child  at  a 
Baptist  Sunday-school,  as  a  prize  for  committing  to  mem- 
ory the  entire  Book  of  Proverbs.  As  a  task  in  mnemonics 
I  would  rather  undertake  to  memorize  the  four  Gospels, 
the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  and  all  the  Epistles.  Somebody 
once  sagely  remarked  that  the  dictionary  was  a  very  in- 
teresting work,  but  that  "it  changed  subjects  too  often." 
That's  precisely  the  difficulty  with  King  Solomon's 
Proverbs  when  one  undertakes  to  learn  them  by  heart. 
If  any  person  who  is  proud  of  his  memory  doubts  the 
truth  of  this,  let  him  try  it. 

In  personal  appearance  Mr.  Wilson  was  much  more 
the  profound  scholar  than  the  ideal  statesman.  Slender, 
graceful,  not  above  the  middle  stature,  with  an  exqui- 
sitely shaped  head,  a  Greek  nose,  a  handsome,  genial, 
kindly  face,  dark,  laughing  eyes,  a  fine  crown  of  iron- 
gray  hair,  and  a  long,  drooping  mustache,  he  would  have 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  353 

been  picked  out  in  any  assembly  by  a  judge  of  human 
nature  as  a  man  of  great  mental  capacity  and  of  highest 
intelligence.  To  see  him  pitted  against  "the  Big  One" 
from  Maine,  as  he  frequently  was,  always  reminded  me 
of  the  story  of  David  and  Goliath. 

Wilson  was  as  learned,  as  witty,  and  as  humorous  as 
Reed.  He  was  more  eloquent.  Reed  wielded  the  battle- 
ax;  Wilson,  the  Damascus  blade.  He  prepared  his 
speeches  with  greater  care  and  polished  them  more 
highly.  In  delivery  he  was  more  pleasing,  in  manner 
far  more  gracious  and  captivating. 

The  only  reason  why  so  many  of  his  mots  and  repartees 
are  not  quoted  is  that  by  reason  of  his  tenderness  of  heart 
he  could  not  make  up  his  mind  to  say  a  thing  that  hurt, 
while  Reed  had  no  sort  of  hesitancy  in  breaking  bones. 
On  the  contrary,  he  delighted  in  seeing  the  wounded  kick 
and  flutter. 

I  have  frequently  witnessed  Mr.  Wilson  speaking  under 
great  provocation,  but  I  never  heard  him  make  but  one 
sharp,  biting,  personal  retort  on  his  tormentors,  and,  such 
was  his  unconquerable  amiability,  that  he  stopped  and 
recalled  it  instanter. 

The  dramatic  element  in  oratory  affects  an  audience 
perhaps  more  than  any  other.  The  greatest  oratorical 
tournament  this  world  ever  saw  was  during  the  impeach- 
ment of  Warren  Hastings. 

As  a  fitting  climax  to  his  spectacular  speech,  Sheridan 
managed  to  fall  back  in  a  fainting  fit  into  the  arms  of 
Edmund  Burke.  Mr.  Wilson  was  above  any  such  his- 
trionic trick  as  that;  but  at  the  conclusion  of  his  closing 
speech  on  the  original  Wilson  Tariff  bill,  before  the  sena- 
torial artists  had  so  carved  it  that  its  sponsors  disowned 
it,  there  happened  one  of  the  most  dramatic  scenes  ever 
witnessed  in  any  parliamentary  body  on  earth  when  Will- 
iam J.  Bryan,  "the  Boy  Orator  of  the  Platte,"  and  Harry 
St.  George  Tucker,  the  young  Virginia  Hotspur,  took  the 

Vol.  I.— 23 


354   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

brilliant  West- Virginian  on  their  shoulders — very  much 
against  his  will — and  carried  him  in  triumph  to  the  cloak- 
room, amid  the  plaudits  of  the  members  and  the  shouts 
of  the  galleries. 

That  was  a  great  day  for  Wilson  and  the  country — 
and  that  triumphal  procession  deserves  to  live  on  immor- 
tal canvas. 

He  was  exceedingly  sensitive.-  Isador  Strauss,  who 
went  so  gallantly  to  his  death  on  the  Titanic,  served  in  the 
House  of  the  Fifty-third  Congress,  and  loved  Wilson  as 
a  brother,  told  me  this  incident  in  191 2:  He  said  that 
Wilson  had  worn  himself  out  in  his  long  and  nerve-rack- 
ing labors  on  the  Tariff  bill,  and  when  he  learned  that 
President  Cleveland  was  sore  displeased  with  the  results 
he  broke  down  utterly,  placed  his  arms  on  the  table  and 
his  head  on  his  arms,  and  cried  like  a  child.  Here  was 
this  delicately  built  man,  who  had  faced  death  on  a  score 
of  battle-fields  from  the  first  Manassas  to  Appomattox 
with  unflinching  courage,  weeping  copious  tears  because 
his  political  chief  was  not  satisfied  with  what  he  had  done, 
when  as  a  matter  of  fact  he  had  done  the  best  he  could 
under  the  circumstances,  and  with  the  men  whose  votes 
he  had  to  have  in  order  to  pass  any  Tariff  bill  at  all.  I 
haven't  even  a  shadow  of  doubt  that  his  toil  on  that  ill- 
starred  bill  and  the  pronounced  disapproval  with  which  it 
met,  as  evidenced  by  his  own  defeat  and  the  slaughter 
of  his  friends,  ruined  his  health  and  hastened  his  death — 
for  he  was  still  a  young  man  when  he  went  to  join  his 
fathers. 

The  question  is  often  asked,  "Do  speeches  ever  change 
votes  in  Congress.?"  Since  the  sun  set  that  day  I  have 
been  prepared  to  answer  that  question  emphatically  in 
the  affirmative.  That  thirty  minutes'  speech,  and  the 
indescribable  and  contagious  enthusiasm  it  engendered, 
brought  at  least  twenty  kickers  into  line.  It  should  be 
studied  carefully  by  all  budding  statesmen  and  embryo 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  355 

orators,  as  a  model.  When  the  roll  was  being  called,  as 
certain  names  were  pronounced  by  the  clerk  and  the 
responses  were  "aye,''  John  DeWitt  Warner,  the  great 
free-trader,  said  to  me,  **An  hour  ago  those  men  had  no 
more  idea  of  voting  for  that  bill  than  flying/' 

On  that  occasion  Mr.  Wilson  had  every  conceivable 
motive  to  nerve  him  to  the  supreme  effort  of  his  life — 
ambition,  rivalry,  patriotism,  love  of  truth,  as  fine  an 
audience  as  the  most  fastidious  could  desire,  and  the  cer- 
tainty that  the  next  morning  his  words  would  be  pub- 
lished in  every  great  daily  printed  in  the  English  language. 

Expectation  was  great,  and  the  expectation  was  fully 
realized,  for  he  spoke  as  one  inspired.  In  that  half-hour 
he  established  the  high-water  mark  for  eloquence,  both 
for  himself  and  the  House  of  Representatives. 

POPULAR  DELUSION  AS  TO  PUBLIC  DOCUMENTS 

The  government  of  the  United  States  is  the  most 
extravagant  that  ever  was  or  ever  will  be  on  earth — • 
chiefly  because  this  is  the  richest  nation  under  the  sun. 
Among  other  things,  it  maintains  the  biggest  and  best- 
equipped  printing-office  known  among  men  since  Guten- 
berg invented  movable  types. 

Most  persons  believe  that  a  Representative  or  Senator 
can  get  all  the  books,  documents,  speeches,  and  govern- 
ment publications  he  wants  free — ^which  is  absolutely 
incorrect.  Of  books,  documents,  etc.,  each  Representa- 
tive has  a  certain  quota,  and  no  more — usually  twenty- 
six.  A  Senator's  quota  is  considerably  larger.  So  far 
as  speeches  made  in  the  House  or  Senate  are  concerned, 
the  government  prints  them  in  the  daily  Congressional 
Record,  of  which  each  Representative  has  fifty-one  placed 
to  his  credit — a  Senator  a  few  more;  but  if  either  a  Sena- 
tor or  a  Representative  desires  copies  of  his  own  speech 
Ql  ^QV^^hody  else's,  he  must  pay  for  them  out  of  his  owrii^ 


356   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

pocket.  He  may  have  them  printed  at  the  Government 
Printing  Office  or  elsewhere,  and  it  is  considerably  cheaper 
to  have  them  printed  elsewhere,  as  the  Government  Print- 
ing Office  figures  on  a  basis  of  ten  per  cent,  net  profit  to 
the  government.  During  my  first  term  a  certain  editor, 
not  in  my  own  district,  not  even  in  my  own  state,  wrote 
me  asking  that  I  send  him  ten  thousand  copies  of  another 
man's  long  speech.  He  was  so  ignorant  as  to  believe 
that  the  government  prints  speeches  free.  I  declined,  on 
the  ground  that  they  would  cost  at  least  one  hundred 
dollars  and  that  I  was  too  poor  to  afford  it.  I  explained 
the  whole  thing  to  him  in  as  kind  a  manner  as  possible, 
but  it  made  a  mortal  enemy  of  him  and  he  has  never 
lost  an  opportunity  to  assail  or  slander  me  since.  He  is 
now  holding  a  fat  Federal  job! 

Of  all  the  books  ever  published  by  the  government,  The 
Horse  Book  was  the  most  popular.  It  is  now  out  of 
print.  I  once  gained  a  lawsuit  by  reason  of  having  read 
that  book.  A  man  drove  a  livery-stable  horse  to  death 
and  dechned  to  pay  for  him.  I  brought  suit  for  the 
liveryman,  and  we  tried  the  case  before  a  justice  of  the 
peace,  where,  as  the  saying  is,  "everything  goes."  The 
defense  was  that  the  horse  died  of  the  bots.  It  is  gen- 
erally believed  that  bots  eat  through  the  walls  of  a  horse's 
stomach  and  kill  him;  but  The  Horse  Book  says  that 
all  horses  raised  in  the  country,  and  over  three  years  old, 
have  bots,  which  do  them  no  harm.  As  soon  as  the  horse 
dies,  however,  they  eat  through  the  walls  of  the  stomach. 
Hence  the  popular  fallacy  that  bots  kill  horses.  I  read 
that  chapter  to  the  jury,  thereby  securing  a  verdict  for 
my  client. 

During  my  first  year  in  Congress  I  had  an  experience 
about  the  Agricultural  Year-Books  which  cost  me  several 
good  dollars  and  cut  my  wisdom  teeth — on  that  subject 
at  least.  I  had  never  read  one  in  my  life.  I  took  as 
sober  truth  the  frequent  assertion  of  newspapers  that  they 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  357 

were  flat,  stale,  and  unprofitable — dry  as  a  powder-house, 
fit  only  to  be  used  as  a  soporific,  a  sure  cure  for  insomnia. 
It  so  happens  that  a  Representative's  quota  of  the  Year- 
Books  is  the  largest  of  all  books — nine  hundred  and  ninety- 
four.  As  tutored  by  the  newspapers,  I  regarded  the  Year- 
Books  as  a  nuisance,  never  dreaming  that  anybody  actually 
wanted  them.  So  I  told  my  secretary  to  send  them  to 
the  first  nine  hundred  and  ninety-four  farmers  he  could 
think  of — ^which  he  did.  Then  I  had  a  sad  and  sudden 
awakening.  I  began  to  receive  requests  for  them.  I 
went  down  to  a  second-hand-book  store  and  bought  copies 
to  supply  the  demand,  which  continued  until  I  purchased 
four  hundred.  I  then  bought  one  for  myself  and  read  it. 
To  my  utter  surprise  I  found  it  what  Horace  Greeley 
called  "very  interesting  reading."  Since  that  expen- 
sive experience  I  keep  my  quota  of  the  Agricultural 
Year-Book  in  stock  until  they  are  called  for,  and  I  read 
them  religiously. 

Once  upon  a  time  an  amusing  thing  to  the  public,  an 
aggravating  thing  to  Col.  R.  H.  Bodine,  then  Represent- 
ative in  Congress  from  the  Second  Missouri  District, 
happened  to  him,  touching  Chickens  bulletins.  The  Agri- 
cultural Department  issued  a  bulletin  on  chickens,  illus- 
trated with  fine  pictures  of  a  trio  of  every  known  breed 
of  chickens.  Colonel  Bodine  distributed  his  quota  of 
bulletins  to  the  housewives  of  his  bailiwick.  One  of  his 
constituents,  Major  Henry  A.  Newman,  was  an  incorrigi- 
ble joker,  a  poHtical  enemy  to  Bodine.  So  he  informed 
the  people  that  the  pictures  of  the  chickens  in  the  bulletin 
were  pictures  of  the  chickens  which  the  government  was 
distributing  free,  and  all  they  had  to  do  to  secure  a  trio 
of  any  breed  desired  was  to  write  Colonel  Bodine,  who 
would  promptly  and  gladly  send  on  the  poultry.  The 
consequence  was  that  Colonel  Bodine  was  flooded  with 
letters  asking  for  chickens  until  his  "condition  was  ren- 
dered  intolerable" — to   use   the   phraseology  of  divorce 


358   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

statutes  and  petitions.  It  kept  himself  and  his  clerk  on 
the  jump  for  several  weeks,  writing  letters  explaining  that 
the  government  was  not  engaged  in  the  free  coinage  of 
poultry,  and  that  therefore  he  had  no  chickens  to  send 
them.  The  situation  was  growing  tense  and  serious,  when 
it  leaked  out  that  Major  Newman  was  at  the  bottom  of 
the  scheme.  Then  the  whole  thing  ended  in  a  loud  guf- 
faw throughout  the  district. 

Incidentally,  and  as  a  palpable  non  sequitufy  it  may  be 
stated  that  the  bulletins  of  the  Agricultural  Department 
are  among  the  most  popular  of  government  publications. 

If  when  I  first  came  to  Congress  I  had  known  that  I 
was  destined  to  remain  in  the  House  half  a  lifetime,  and 
had  preserved  all  the  queer  letters  I  have  received,  pub- 
lishing them  in  a  book  precisely  as  they  were  written, 
they  would  have  made  a  unique  and  interesting  volume. 
Some  of  the  requests  are  amazing. 

Most  of  the  things  printed  in  The  Congressional  Record, 
or  as  public  documents  or  in  book  shape,  are  valuable  if 
they  could  only  be  delivered  to  the  persons  interested  in 
the  subjects  treated.  Of  course  the  privilege  of  printing 
in  The  Congressional  Record  and  in  the  shape  of  docu- 
ments and  books  is  abused. 

One  of  the  most  glaring  abuses  was  in  printing  the  so- 
called  Jefferson  Bible  in  full  red  Turkey  morocco.  Of 
this  document  each  Representative's  quota  was  twenty- 
six.  I  had  at  least  two  thousand  requests  for  it.  People 
were  led  to  believe,  by  the  hullaballoo  in  the  newspapers, 
that  it  was  a  newly  discovered  book  written  on  the  sub- 
ject of  religion  by  Thomas  Jefferson,  touching  whose 
reUgious  opinions  there  is  an  unending  controversy.  But 
he  never  wrote  a  word  of  this  so-called  Jefferson  Bible. 
What  he  did  do  was  to  cut  all  the  sayings  of  Jesus  out  of 
a  Greek  Testament,  a  Latin  Testament,  a  French  Testa- 
ment, and  an  English  Testament,  printing  them  in  four 
columns  side  by  side  in  a  blank-book.     The  reason  he 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  359 

did  that  was,  he  said,  that  what  Jesus  said  was  all  right, 
but  that  the  apostles  and  disciples  muddled  it.  Any  one 
who  could  read  the  four  languages  could  have  dupHcated 
his  performance,  and  the  Jefferson  Bible  could  be  of  no 
sort  of  use  to  any  one  who  could  not  read  the  four  lan- 
guages aforementioned.  By  order  of  the  House,  how- 
ever, it  was  printed  as  a  public  document.  In  the  upper 
left-hand  corner  of  the  wrapper,  in  great  block  type,  were 
printed  these  words:  **The  Morals  of  Jesus,  by  Thomas 
Jefferson." 

An  aggravating  feature  was  that  if  you  put  a  dozen 
copies  in  the  mail  without  registering  them,  you  were 
fortunate  if  half  reached  those  for  whom  they  were 
intended. 

For  a  long  time  I  was  opposed  to  members  printing  in 
The  Record  words,  editorials,  articles,  and  speeches  not 
delivered  in  the  House;  but  I  finally  changed  my  mind 
on  that  subject.  I  concluded  that  it  was  preferable  to 
let  them  be  printed  rather  than  be  compelled  to  listen  to 
them. 

Another  reason  why  I  changed  my  opinion  in  this 
matter  is  that  some  speeches  of  much  value,  printed  in 
The  Congressional  Record,  were  never  delivered  in  Con- 
gress, the  most  remarkable  case  perhaps  being  the 
famous  Silver  speech  of  John  G.  Carlisle,  most  frequently 
quoted  of  all  his  speeches.  He  wrote  it  in  the  quietude  of 
his  library  and  inserted  it  in  The  Record  under  "a  blanket 
leave  to  print"  granted  to  all  members  on  a  particular 
bill. 

LIBERALITY    AND    MISTAKEN     PUBLIC     OPINION 
AS     TO     PENSIONS 

The  Federal  government  is  the  most  liberal  one  on  the 
face  of  the  earth  in  granting  pensions — too  liberal,  many 
persons  say.  It  is  a  huge  pension  roll  and  it  requires 
vast  sums  of  money  to  pay  the  veterans  their  stipends, 


36o   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

It  goes  without  saying  that  a  country  which  steadfastly 
refuses  to  maintain  a  large  standing  army  must  have  a 
liberal  pension  system  for  her  volunteer  soldiers. 

A  great  many  people  beHeve  that  a  large  percentage  of 
the  men  drawing  pensions  are  not  entitled  to  them.  No 
doubt  there  are  some,  but  after  twenty-five  years  in  an 
official  position,  which  tends  to  make  one  familiar  with  the 
facts,  I  am  of  the  opinion  that  the  number  drawing 
pensions  who  are  not  doing  so  rightfully  is  somewhat 
exaggerated.  Appearances  are  frequently  deceptive — 
decidedly  so  in  this  matter  as  in  many  others.  So  are 
the  records. 

It  is  said  that  "an  open  confession  is  good  for  the  soul." 
I  am  willing  to  make  one.  Prior  to  entering  Congress  I 
had  never  paid  any  attention  to  the  pension  question. 
I  had  so  often  heard  it  said  that  a  large  percentage  of 
pensions  should  not  be  allowed  that  naturally  I  believed 
it.  Consequently,  as  soon  as  I  was  elected  I  began  to 
save  up  material  for  an  anti-pension  speech,  which  mate- 
rial I  have  yet — unused  and  never  to  be  used.  I  went  to 
Washington,  kept  my  ears  open,  listened  to  the  discus- 
sion of  private  pension  bills,  and  discovered,  very  much 
to  my  surprise,  that  the  beneficiaries  of  most  of  the  bills 
were  entitled  to  pensions,  but  were  shut  out  by  some 
technicality.  For  instance,  the  law  then  provided  for  a 
service  of  ninety  days.  Of  course  there  had  to  be  a 
general  rule  on  the  subject,  and  the  rule  read  ninety  days. 
It  happened  that  an  entire  battahon,  recruited  in  my 
district,  served  eighty-nine  days.  Now  I  defy  anybody 
to  show  any  substantial  reason  why  an  eighty-nine  days' 
man  was  not  as  much  entitled  to  a  pension  as  a  ninety 
days'  man — the  cases  being  on  all-fours  in  other  respects. 
That's  an  example  of  how  a  deserving  soldier  might  be 
shut  out  by  technicalities.  I  observed  other  facts  of 
similar  tenor,  and  began  to  examine  with  an  open  mind 
into  the  case  of  each  applicant  from  my  bailiwick,  and 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  361 

where  there  was  merit  in  the  claim  I  attended  to  it,  and 
by  so  doing  have  kept  several  old  soldiers  and  soldiers' 
widows  out  of  the  almshouse  and  have  ameliorated  the 
condition  of  many  more  and  of  many  orphan  children — 
for  all  of  which  1  ask  nobody's  pardon. 

Here  are  some  interesting  and  enhghtening  experiences 
which  I  have  had.  At  Louisiana,  Missouri,  lived  an  ex- 
soldier  of  the  Civil  War,  named  Frederick  Wiseman.  He 
was  over  six  feet  in  his  stockings,  weighed  over  two  hun- 
dred, and  appeared  perfect  physically.  He  was  as  fine  a 
specimen  of  physical  man  for  his  age,  apparently,  as  could 
be  found.  He  was  drawing  a  small  pension  and  asked  me 
to  secure  an  increase.  One  day  I  met  him  on  the  street, 
and  he  said:  "You  think  that  because  I  am  a  smashing- 
big  man  that  there's  nothing  the  matter  with  me,  but  I 
am  so  badly  ruptured  on  both  sides  that  I  hardly  ever 
walk  the  few  blocks  from  my  home  to  my  office,  or  back 
again,  without  being  compelled  to  dodge  out  of  sight  to 
arrange  my  truss."  I  investigated  his  statement  and 
found  it  to  be  absolutely  true.  Then  the  only  question 
to  be  settled  was  whether  his  rupture  was  of  service 
origin. 

One  day  in  the  long  ago,  when  I  was  a  candidate  for 
the  first  office  I  ever  held — city  attorney  of  Louisiana, 
Missouri — I  was  down  at  the  Chicago  &  Alton  R.  R. 
depot,  and  was  introduced  to  Tom  Folwell  as  "Captain" 
Folwell,  who  was  working  on  the  section.  I  noticed  that 
he  had  a  bad  squint  in  one  eye.  When  my  friend  who 
had  introduced  us  and  I  got  out  of  ear-shot,  I  inquired 
why  he  called  Folwell  captain.  "Because  he  was  a  cap- 
tain, and  what's  more  he  is  one  of  the  real  heroes  of  the 
Civil  War."  Then  he  told  me  that  Folwell  was  the  first 
man  who  took  a  transport  past  Vicksburg,  and  that 
General  Grant  promoted  him  from  the  ranks  to  a  cap- 
taincy for  that  hazardous  performance.  He  explained  that 
the  way  Folwell  came  to  have  that  squint  in  his  eye  was 


362   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

that  when  the  Confederates  were  bombarding  his  trans- 
port a  cannon-ball  hit  it,  knocking  the  timbers  to  pieces, 
and  that  a  splinter  hit  Folwell  in  the  eye,  giving  it  that 
permanent  squint.  For  many  years  the  injury  simply 
disfigured  him  without  damaging  his  eyesight,  but  as  he 
grew  older  he  began  to  go  bhnd  in  that  eye.  During  my 
early  service  in  Congress  he  was  advised  by  a  "mutual 
friend"  to  ask  my  assistance  in  securing  him  a  pension; 
but  in  that  far-away  day  poHtical  Hnes  were  sharply 
drawn  in  Missouri.  I  was  a  Democratic  Congressman 
and  Captain  Folwell  was  a  stanch  Republican,  and  his 
reply  to  our  friend's  kindly  suggestion  was  that  there  was 
no  use  in  applying  to  me,  because  he  knew  that  I  would 
do  nothing  for  him.  I  kept  on  going  to  Congress,  and 
his  eye,  together  with  his  health,  got  worse  and  worse. 
So,  after  I  had  been  in  Congress  several  years  he  wrote 
me  asking  that  I  introduce  a  special  bill  for  him,  which 
I  did  gladly,  because  I  believed  he  was  honestly  entitled 
to  it;  but  it  was  too  late.  I  secured  the  passage  of  the 
bill  through  the  House,  but  he  died  before  it  could  be 
passed  through  the  Senate.  If  Captain  Folwell  had 
served  under  Napoleon  and  had  performed  such  a  feat 
as  he  performed  at  Vicksburg,  he  would  have  been 
decorated  with  the  Grand  Cross  of  the  Legion  of  Honor. 

In  Bowling  Green,  Missouri,  lived  an  old  soldier  named 
Preston,  a  plasterer  by  trade,  who  had  been  a  private  in 
an  Illinois  regiment.  He  was  an  intense  Republican, 
possessed  a  considerable  gift  of  speech,  and  during  cam- 
paigns would  make  political  speeches  in  the  small  towns 
and  school-houses.  To  him  all  Democrats — particularly 
myself — ^were  anathema.  He  laid  on  and  spared  not; 
but  as  old  age  came  creeping  on  him  he  began  to  go  blind. 
He  applied  to  the  Pension  Office  for  a  pension,  and  was 
refused.  Here  was  his  case:  At  Resaca,  or  Kenesaw 
Mountain,  or  somewhere  in  that  campaign,  the  Confed- 
erate   batteries   were,    from    high    ground,    shelling    the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  3^3 

Federals.  The  brigade  to  which  Preston  belonged  was 
ordered  to  lie  down  in  order  to  escape  injury.  While  he 
was  lying  on  his  stomach  a  shell  exploded  above  him  and 
a  piece  of  it  made  a  bad  raking  wound  in  his  hip,  tearing 
the  flesh  and  fracturing  the  bone.  Hence  his  faihng 
vision.  The  Pension  Office  doctors,  however,  declared 
there  was  no  possible  connection  between  a  wound  in 
his  hip  and  his  eyesight,  and  laughed  him  to  scorn.  So 
he  came  to  me  as  a  dernier  ressort,  notwithstanding  his  ver- 
bal assaults  upon  me  in  his  stump  speeches.  He  related 
his  story  as  I  have  given  it  above,  and,  knowing  very 
little  about  anatomy,  I  told  him  that  I  agreed  with  the 
Pension  Office  doctors  that  his  hip  injury  was  in  no  way 
responsible  for  his  blindness.  He  asked  me  if  I  would 
believe  what  Doctor  Reynolds,  the  oldest  physician  in 
town,  also  the  leading  Republican,  would  say.  I  in- 
dicated my  faith  in  any  diagnosis  Doctor  Reynolds 
would  make.  So  we  went  to  see  him.  He  was  a  plain, 
blunt  man  of  wide  experience  and  positive  opinions.  He 
"cussed"  the  Pension  Office  doctors  through  all  the 
colors  of  the  rainbow  as  a  job  lot  of  ignoramuses,  swore 
that  Preston's  blindness  was  caused  by  the  nervous 
shock  of  the  shell-wound  in  his  hip,  and  promptly  made 
affidavit  to  that  effect.  Two  other  local  physicians  did 
the  same  thing. 

I  took  the  affidavits,  and  when  the  Congress  opened  I 
introduced  a  private  bill  for  him.  One  day  I  sat  down 
by  Gen.  David  B.  Henderson,  a  splendid  gentleman  of 
Iowa,  subsequently  Speaker  of  the  House.  He  was  just 
out  of  a  hospital,  where  a  section  of  his  leg  had  been  ampu- 
tated. He  gave  me  his  experience.  At  Corinth  a  rifle- 
ball  went  through  bis  ankle,  and  the  amputation  was 
made  a  few  inches  above  the  wound.  Necrosis  of  the 
bone  set  in,  and  his  leg  was  thereafter  amputated  piece- 
meal every  few  years.  He  said  that  when  the  surgeons 
were  preparing  to  make  the  last  operation  they  debated 


364   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

as  to  whether  they  would  amputate  his  leg  at  the  hip- 
joint,  but  abandoned  that  idea  because  ninety  per  cent, 
of  those  upon  whom  that  operation  is  performed  die  of 
the  shock — the  hip-joint  being  the  second  largest  nerve 
center  in  the  body.  General  Henderson's  statement  con- 
firmed me  in  the  belief  of  the  correctness  of  Doctor  Rey- 
nolds's diagnosis.  I  went  out  and  got  Preston's  bill 
reported.  The  very  morning  I  was  going  to  call  it  up  for 
passage  I  received  a  telegram  from  Doctor  Reynolds 
saying  that  the  night  before  Preston  had  suddenly  died 
of  total  paralysis — ^which  vindicated  his  diagnosis  of  the 
case. 

In  my  home  town  there  lived  a  Union  soldier  named 
Foley,  who  had  a  long,  deep  scar  across  his  face  and  the 
upper  part  of  his  nose.  He  was  a  painter  by  trade — an 
industrious  man.  When  he  was  nearly  sixty  he  began 
to  go  bhnd.  He  applied  for  a  pension  on  the  ground  that 
the  cut  on  his  face — which  he  alleged  was  made  by  a 
Confederate  saber — was  the  cause  of  his  failing  eyesight. 
The  Pension  Office  rejected  his  claim  by  reason  of  the 
fact  that  he  had  no  hospital  record.  He  came  to  me  to 
secure  the  passage  of  a  private  pension  bill  for  him.  I 
told  him  why  the  Pension  Office  turned  him  down.  He 
said,  "I  was  never  in  a  hospital  in  my  life.  When  I 
received  this  saber  wound  I  was  a  healthy  young  chap, 
twenty  years  old,  serving  in  a  Pennsylvania  cavalry  regi- 
ment in  the  Army  of  the  Potomac.  One  day  a  lieutenant 
took  about  twenty  of  us  on  a  scouting  expedition.  We 
encountered  a  squad  of  Stuart's  cavalry  and  had  a  battle 
out  in  the  woods,  in  which  I  was  slashed  across  the  face 
by  a  saber.  The  lieutenant  had  taken  a  course  of  medi- 
cal lectures,  had  been  a  clerk  in  a  drug-store,  and  carried 
a  small  pocket-case  of  scissors,  needles,  etc.,  as  first  aids 
to  the  injured.  As  soon  as  the  skirmish  ended  he  washed 
my  wound,  sewed  up  the  gash,  and  put  some  sticking- 
plaster  on  it.     Being  in  good  health,  the  wound  healed 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  365 

by  what  the  doctors  call  'first  intention/  and  I  never 
lost  even  a  day's  service  on  account  of  it/'  I  told  him 
that  that  was  a  very  fine  story,  if  he  could  prove  it.  He 
inquired  what  evidence  was  necessary.  I  replied  that  it 
would  be  necessary  to  produce  the  affidavit  of  the  lieu- 
tenant, if  he  were  living,  and  if  possible  the  affidavits  of 
two  members  of  the  squad.  He  declared  that  that  would 
be  difficult,  as  he  had  lived  in  the  West  for  thirty  years 
and  had  heard  nothing  of  his  companions  in  arms,  but 
that  he  would  try.  In  less  than  two  months  he  secured 
the  affidavits  of  two  privates  and  of  the  lieutenant,  who 
was  then  a  practising  physician  out  in  Kansas.  With 
these  affidavits,  together  with  the  affidavits  of  three 
reputable  physicians  that  his  growing  blindness  was 
caused  by  the  saber  cut,  I  secured  the  passage  of  a 
private  bill  for  the  old  man's  relief. 

One  of  the  most  difficult  things  to  do  in  Congress  is  to 
have  the  charge  of  desertion  removed  from  a  soldier's 
record.  Nobody  has  any  respect  for  a  deserter — nobody 
should  have.  Union  and  Confederate  soldiers  in  Con- 
gress join  forces  in  fighting  bills  to  remove  charges  of 
desertion.  A  case  has  to  be  made  as  clear  as  crystal  to 
appeal  to  them.  There  is  no  other  charge  which  a  soldier 
so  angri  y  resents.  Many  soldiers,  however,  at  the  close 
of  the  war  stood  on  the  rolls  marked  as  deserters  who 
were  really  not  deserters.  When  absent  on  roll-call — 
absence  unexplained — they  were  noted  as  deserters  by 
the  orderly  sergeants,  and  they  remained  in  that  status 
where  the  orderly  sergeants  were  lazy  or  careless.  There 
are  two  ways  by  which  to  remove  such  charges.  First, 
the  Secretary  of  War  may  do  it  in  certain  cases,  if  he 
wishes  so  to  do.  In  cases  perfectly  plain  he  generally 
does  so.  Second,  in  all  cases  Congress  can  remove  the 
charges. 

I  had  one  experience  about  removing  the  charge  of 
desertion  which  was  both  interesting  and  illuminating. 


366   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

William  D.  McLean  was  my  neighbor  and  friend.  When 
I  first  entered  the  House  he  asked  me  to  look  after  his 
pension  claim,  which  I  did,  and  which  the  Pension 
Office  rejected  on  the  ground  that  there  were  three  charges 
of  desertion  against  him.  Then  I  applied  to  the  Secre- 
tary of  War  to  remove  the  charges — which  he  refused  to 
do.  Then  I  introduced  a  private  bill  for  his  relief.  At 
the  end  of  twenty  years  the  charge  was  removed  by  Act 
of  Congress. 

Here  is  McLean's  story:  A  green  Scotch  lad,  he 
landed  in  America  about  the  beginning  of  the  Civil  War, 
and  promptly  enhsted,  served  four  years,  and,  as  the  facts 
ultimately  proved,  was  a  good  soldier.  The  way  the 
three  charges  of  desertion  happened  to  stand  against  him 
was  this:  He  was  sent  to  a  hospital  because  of  wounds  or 
sickness.  As  soon  as  he  was  able  to  get  out  he  did  not 
hunt  up  his  old  regiment,  but  promptly  enlisted  in  the 
first  that  came  along.  In  that  way  he  served  four  years, 
but  in  four  different  regiments.  Because  he  did  not  know 
where  his  companions  in  arms  lived,  it  was  extremely 
difficult,  well-nigh  impossible,  to  verify  his  story;  but 
finally  it  was  accompHshed,  his  record  was  cleared  of  the 
three  charges  of  desertion,  and  he  was  granted  a  pension 
which  ought  to  have  been  granted  a  score  of  years  be- 
fore, as  there  was  ample  proof  that  he  was  entitled  to  it, 
by  reason  of  injuries  received  in  the  line  of  duty.  I  hope 
that  "Mac"  will  live  many  years  to  enjoy  his  stipend; 
but  he  enjoys  more  having  his  military  record  cleared 
than  he  does  his  pension. 

It  will  surprise  many  persons  to  know  that  the  Pension 
Office,  instead  of  winking  at  fraudulent  claimants,  is  on 
the  constant  lookout  for  them.  If  there  is  any  doubt 
in  a  case  a  pension  is  never  granted  until  by  investigation 
the  claim  is  ascertained  to  be  just.  If  after  a  pension  is 
granted  there  is  a  hint  that  the  beneficiary  is  not  honestly 
€ntitk4  %Q  hi§  pension,  ^  depanm^m^l  agent  k  ^m%  X(^ 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  367 

the  pensioner's  neighborhood  to  gather  all  the  informa- 
tion possible,  and  if  the  preponderance  of  evidence  is 
against  the  pensioner  he  is  separated  from  his  pension. 
I  am  fully  aware  that  many  good  citizens  never  heard  of 
all  this,  and  believe  that  the  Pension  Office  puts  in  a  large 
part  of  its  time  encouraging  unworthy  claimants  in  getting 
on  the  rolls,  but  I  have  stated  the  plain  and  exact  truth 
about  it,  the  skeptics  to  the  contrary  notwithstanding. 
I  am  not  guessing  at  it.     I  know  whereof  I  speak. 

In  my  county  a  man  drew  a  pension  for  several  years 
by  reason  of  varicose  veins.  One  of  his  comrades  got 
mad  with  him  and  tipped  the  Pension  Office  off  to  the 
fact  that  his  disease  was  not  of  "service  origin,^'  but  ante- 
dated his  enHstment — ^which,  if  true,  barred  him.  A 
special  pension  agent  was  sent  out  to  investigate,  and 
upon  his  report  the  man's  name  was  struck  from  the 
roster  of  pensioners.  His  neighbors  appealed  to  me  to 
have  the  case  reopened,  stating  that  he  was  a  thoroughly 
honest  man,  in  bad  condition  by  reason  of  his  varicose 
veins,  which  they  declared  were  of  service  origin.  At 
my  request,  incorporating  their  statement,  the  Pension 
Office  reopened  the  case,  sent  another  special  agent,  who 
reinvestigated  the  case  with  the  same  result — separation 
from  the  pension  roll. 

I  had  a  neighbor  from  East  Tennessee,  named  Honey- 
cutt,  who  drew  a  pension  for  more  than  a  quarter  of  a 
century,  and  then  came  to  grief.  His  case  is  another 
illustration  of  the  ancient  saying  that  "hell  hath  no  fury 
like  a  woman  scorned."  In  an  evil  hour  for  himself,  he 
sued  his  old  wife  for  a  divorce,  whereupon  she  promptly 
informed  the  Pension  Bureau  that  her  husband  had 
served  two  years  in  the  Confederate  Army  prior  to  his 
service  in  the  Union  Arm}^,  and  therefore  was  not  entitled 
to  a  pension — all  of  which,  upon  investigation,  turned  out 
to  be  true,  and  Honeycutt  was  separated  from  the  govern- 
ment pay-roll,  though  there  was  no  doubt  about  his  service 


368   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

in  the  Union  Army  or  about  his  disabilities  being  of  "ser- 
vice origin/*  Most  assuredly  his  wife  played  even.  She 
evidently  agreed  with  Lord  Byron,  who  said,  "Sweet  is 
revenge!"  And  he  ought  to  have  known,  for  he  was  one 
of  the  most  revengeful  of  mortals. 

In  my  district  there  was  an  old  soldier  almost  stone- 
blind.  He  was  as  poor  as  Lazarus,  had  a  large  family, 
and  was  a  charge  on  the  community.  He  appHed  for  a 
pension,  and  of  course  his  neighbors,  upon  whose  charity 
he  and  his  family  lived,  were  anxious  for  him  to  get  it; 
but  the  Pension  Bureau  would  have  none  of  him,  deciding 
after  thorough  investigation  that  his  blindness  was  not 
of  service  origin,  but  the  result  of  his  own  gross  immorality 
subsequent  to  his  discharge  from  the  army. 

The  district  which  I  represent  is  inhabited  by  many 
old  Union  soldiers  and  many  old  Confederates — much  as 
the  EngHshman  takes  his  ale,  "'alf  and  'alf.''  There  is 
absolutely  no  animosity  between  them.  The  soldiers  of 
the  Civil  War  discovered  years  and  years  ago  what  cer- 
tain lachrymose  orators  and  writers  are  just  finding  out 
at  this  late  day,  that  this  is  in  very  truth  a  reunited 
country.  It  may  surprise  some  of  the  haystack  brigade, 
whose  skins  and  homes  were  safe  during  the  war  between 
the  states  and  who  still  nurse  their  hatred,  that  in  almost 
every  case  where  a  Union  soldier  writes  me  to  secure  him 
a  pension  or  have  his  pension  increased  his  ex-Confed- 
erate neighbor  also  writes  asking  me  to  do  all  in  my 
power  to  aid  his  Union-soldier  friend.  They  seem  to 
take  pleasure  in  doing  so.  Most  assuredly,  so  far  as  the 
old  soldiers  are  concerned,  "the  war  is  over." 

Those  who  paid  close  attention  to  the  debate  on  the 
Army  bill  at  the  beginning  of  our  war  with  Germany 
may  have  noted  that  I  was  somewhat  responsible  for 
carrying  an  amendment  preventing  substitutes  or  buy- 
ing out  by  paying  a  commutation  tax,  as  was  done  on 
an  extensive   scale   during  the  Civil  War — a   most   un- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  369 

patriotic  and  disgraceful  thing.  The  amendment  was 
offered  by  Representative  Carl  Hayden,  of  Arizona.  I 
helped  him  secure  its  adoption  by  making  as  vigorous  a 
five-minute  speech  as  I  knew  how.  Why  I  took  so 
much  interest  in  Hayden*s  amendment  was  that  one  of 
my  constituents  wrote  me  to  get  him  a  pension  for  the 
amazing  reason  that  his  substitute  was  killed  in  battle! 
Suffice  it  to  state  that  he  is  still  pensionless.  The  recol- 
lection of  that  astounding  experience  caused  me  to  back 
up  Hayden.  I  was  determined  that  future  Representa- 
tives should  not  be  pestered  about  pensions  for  men  who 
send  substitutes,  and  that  the  rich  and  poor  should  fare 
alike  in  this  war. 


Vol.  I.— 24 


CHAPTER  XIV 

The  Fifty-fourth  a  Do-nothing  Congress — Henderson — Polling  the  House — 
Tammany  speech — Doctor  English — Underwood. 

CONGRESSES  during  whose  life  presidential  elec- 
tions are  held  rarely  transact  much  business. 
They  are  devoted  chiefly  to  politics.  The  Fifty-fourth 
was  no  exception  to  that  rule. 

It  is  narrated  by  a  more  or  less  veracious  chronicler 
that  when  Thomas  Brackett  Reed  was  nominated  by 
the  Republican  caucus  for  Speaker  of  the  House  in  that 
Congress,  in  his  speech  of  acceptance  he  naively  re- 
marked: **The  Fifty-first  Congress  is  famous  for  what 
it  did  do,  while  the  Fifty-fourth  will  be  notable  for  what 
it  does  not  do!"  Had  Speaker  Reed  been  all  the  major 
prophets  rolled  into  one,  he  could  not  have  made  a  more 
exact  prediction;  for  it  did  nothing  except  mere  routine 
work,  such  as  passing  appropriation  bills. 

No  doubt  he  was  supremely  happy  on  that  occasion. 
In  the  Fifty-first  Congress  he  defeated  William  McKin- 
ley  for  the  Speakership  nomination  by  only  two  votes, 
and  was  elected  by  only  a  few  more.  In  that  Congress 
his  career  in  the  chair  was  one  of  storm  and  stress.  In 
the  caucus  of  the  Fifty-fourth  he  was  nominated  by 
unanimous  vote — to  him  a  most  gratifying  performance. 
His  party  followers  constituted  almost  two-thirds  of  the 
House.  The  Democrats  had  adopted  his  code  of  rules, 
in  essence  if  not  in  letter;  and  as  he  had  no  more  parlia- 
mentary revolutions  up  his  sleeve,  he  looked  forward  to 
two  years  in  the  chair  full  of  peace.     Without  exaggera- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  371 

tion,  or  bad  taste,  he  could  have  repeated  Alexander 
Selkirk's  boast: 

I  am  monarch  of  all  I  survey, 
My  right  there  is  none  to  dispute. 

He  could  therefore  spend  much  of  his  time  and  energy 
in  chasing  the  ignis  fatuus  of  a  presidential  nomination, 
which  he  did,  to  his  lasting  unhappiness. 

/ 

OSCAR  W.  UNDERWOOD 

The  most  notable  incident  of  the  House  of  the  Fifty- 
fourth  Congress  was  that  in  it  Oscar  W.  Underwood, 
of  Alabama,  began  his  long  and  distinguished  public 
career,  and  was  promptly  and  expeditiously  flung  out  on 
a  contest.  But  he  returned  to  the  Fifty-fifth,  and  has 
kept  on  returning  to  House  or  Senate  ever  since.  If  he 
felt  hurt,  as  no  doubt  he  did,  he  could  have  taken  hope 
from  the  fact  that  one  of  his  most  eminent  predecessors, 
as  chairman  of  Ways  and  Means — William  McKinley — 
suffered  the  same  fate,  only  to  come  back  and  to  rise  to 
the  dizziest  heights. 

Senator  Underwood  comes  by  his  political  and  law- 
making talents  naturally.  They  are  hereditary.  His 
grandfather  was  a  Senator  of  the  United  States  from 
Kentucky,  and  one  of  his  uncles  was  Lieutenant-Governor 
thereof.  He  himself  was  one  of  the  most  successful  and 
popular  parliamentary  leaders  the  House  has  ever  known. 
Fie  is  already  in  the  front  rank  in  the  Senate — in  fact,  he 
was  in  the  front  rank  immediately  upon  being  sworn  in. 
His  name  is  forever  linked  indissolubly  with  a  great  TarifF 
bill,  part  of  which — the  income  tax — will  endure  as  long 
as  the  Republic  lives.  He  therefore,  in  a  certain  sense, 
has  already  become  a  historic  personage,  though  still  ^ 
comparatively  young  man  ^^  ^t^tesmen  ^je  xu^ix 


372   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Shortly  after  he  was  translated  to  the  Senate  I  asked 
him  if  he  would  be  on  the  Finance  Committee,  which 
corresponds  in  some  of  its  functions  to  the  Committee  on 
Ways  and  Means  in  the  House.  I  naturally  supposed 
that  he  would  desire  that  assignment.  He  replied  by 
telling  an  apt  anecdote.     He  said: 

"Down  in  Kentucky  there  was  a  cobbler  who  unex- 
pectedly inherited  a  large  sum  of  money.  He  locked  up 
his  shop  and  went  out  in  search  of  pleasure — in  all  sorts 
of  wild  dissipation.  Finally  he  spent  all  of  his  money, 
and  returned  to  his  humble  cobbler's  bench.  Not  long 
afterward  a  lawyer  went  to  his  shop  and  informed  the 
cobbler  that  he  had  inherited  another  fortune.  He 
looked  up  from  his  bench  and  said:  *My  God!  must  I 
go  through  all  that  again?*  And  that's  the  way  1  would 
feel  about  another  Tariff  bill!" 


MR.  SPEAKER  HENDERSON 

While  Speaker  Reed's  defeat  for  the  Republican 
presidential  nomination  embittered  his  heart  during  all 
his  remaining  days,  and  ultimately  caused  him  to  quit 
public  life,  his  successor.  Col.  David  Bremner  Henderson, 
of  Iowa,  was  spared  heartburning  on  that  tantalizing 
subject  by  reason  of  having  been  born  in  Scotland — 
being  made  by  the  Constitution  ineligible  to  the  Presi- 
dency. Consequently,  having  achieved  the  highest  posi- 
tion to  which  he  could  attain,  he  was  content  and  happy 
in  the  Speakership. 

He  was  a  handsome  and  commanding  figure,  and  was 
fully  six  feet  tall.  With  a  splendid  face,  a  symmetrical 
body — neither  too  fat  nor  too  lean — ^with  a  magnificent 
shock  of  iron-gray  hair,  he  compelled  attention  at  any 
place,  in  any  crowd,  or  at  any  time.  He  had  a  clarion 
voice,  which  completely  filled  the  great  hall  of  the  House 
of  Representatives,  and  was  always  heard  gladly  both 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  373 

by  the  members  and  the  galleries.  He  was  an  intense, 
and  sometimes  a  dramatic,  orator.  He  was  a  frequent 
debater,  and  his  long  service,  together  with  his  wide 
information  as  to  legislative  matters,  gave  much  force  to 
his  utterances. 

In  his  first  service  in  the  army  he  lost  a  foot  at  Corinth. 
It  was  amputated  just  above  the  ankle.  As  soon  as  he 
was  well  he  raised  a  regiment,  and  served  as  its  colonel 
to  the  end  of  the  war.  Necrosis  of  the  bone  set  in,  and 
his  leg  was  amputated  piecemeal,  from  time  to  time, 
until  it  was  all  gone.  Generally  he  wore  a  cork  leg,  but 
used  it  so  skilfully  by  aid  of  a  heavy  cane  that  few  per- 
sons observed  that  he  was  lame.  When  that  leg  became 
tender  he  used  crutches.  At  such  times  he  was  extremely 
irritable  and  beUigerent. 

When  we  had  up  the  Cuban  Reciprocity  bill,  Speaker 
Henderson  was  bitterly  opposed  to  it.  Among  those  who 
stood  with  him  in  that  matter  was  the  late  Representa- 
tive Walter  P.  Brownlow,  of  Tennessee.  All  of  a  sudden 
Speaker  Henderson  and  the  Republican  leaders,  under 
White  House  pressure,  changed  sides.  Among  those  who 
changed  was  Brownlow,  who  was  blessed  with  a  fine  sense 
of  humor.  I  was  sufficiently  familiar  with  him  to  take 
liberties.  So,  meeting  him  in  the  cloak-room,  I  said: 
**  Brownlow,  I  hear  you  have  changed  sides  on  the  Cuban 
Reciprocity  bill.     How  did  that  happen?*' 

He  replied,  very  solemnly:  "I  wanted  to  show  Dave 
Henderson  that  I  can  jump  a  fence  as  easily  with  two 
legs  as  he  can  with  one" — ^which  was  an  adequate,  if 
pecuUar,  explanation. 

One  reason  why  Colonel  Henderson  was  elected  Speaker 
was  his  uniform  kindness  to  new  members — which  is 
gratefully  remembered  by  many  men  to  this  day.  There 
are  few  situations  in  life  in  which  a  man  feels  more  lone- 
some than  does  a  new  member  when  he  first  arrives  in 
Washington  to  assume  his  new  honors  and  duties. 


374   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Hon.  Charles  B.  Landis,  of  Indiana — universally  called 
"Charlie" — an  exceedingly  brilliant  orator,  told  me  that 
when  he  first  reached  Washington,  after  being  authorized 
to  write  M.  C.  after  his  name,  he  was  awfully  lonesome, 
and  bluer  than  indigo.  One  day  when  he  was  in  a  par- 
ticularly unhappy  frame  of  mind  he  met  Colonel  Hender- 
son in  the  Speaker's  lobby,  and  Henderson  asked  him 
why  he  was  moping  around  and  was  so  disconsolate. 
Landis  poured  his  tale  of  woe  into  the  ear  of  the  brawny, 
big-hearted  lowan,  whereupon  Colonel  Henderson  slapped 
him  on  the  back  and  said:  "Cheer  up,  my  boy,  you  will 
soon  come  to  the  front  and  make  the  gray-haired  veterans 
sit  up  and  take  notice.  YouVe  got  the  stuff  in  you  to 
do  it.  Don't  fret  or  sulk.  Don't  be  a  *  Knight  of  the 
Sorrowful  Countenance,'  but  go  in  and  show  them  what 
a  country  Hoosier  editor  can  do.  I'll  back  you  for  all 
I'm  worth." 

Charlie  declared  to  me  that  Henderson's  little  speech 
did  him  more  good  than  all  the  sermons  he  had  ever 
heard,  and  from  that  day  he  loved  the  bluff,  hearty 
Scotchman — and,  truth  to  tell,  he  was  worthy  of  his  love. 

I  studied  the  story  told  me  by  Landis,  and  acted  on  it 
ever  afterward.  I  took  new  members — particularly 
Democrats — under  the  shadow  of  my  wing,  and  explained 
to  them  those  things  which  a  Representative  can  learn 
only  by  experience,  as  to  the  conduct  of  business  and  how 
to  force  their  way  toward  the  front.  While  I  did  that  to 
strengthen  our  party  in  the  House  and  without  thought 
of  the  Speakership,  I  have  no  sort  of  doubt  that  one  result 
of  that  line  of  conduct  helped  me  attain  that  position. 
It  certainly  aided  me  very  much  when  as  minority  leader 
I  organized  the  Democratic  minority  into  a  superb  fight- 
ing body. 

While  I  was  serving  my  second  term,  when  Colonel 
Henderson  was  chairman  of  the  great  Committee  on  the 
Judiciary,  I  fought  one  of  his  bills,  tooth  and  nail.     When 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  375 

the  fight  was  over  he  hobbled  over  to  my  seat  and  said, 
** Clark,  did  you  fight  that  bill  because  you  were  against 
it  or  because  you  are  mad  at  me?" 

I  replied,  "Colonel  Henderson,  I  was  dead  against  the 
bill;  that's  why  I  fought  it,  and  not  because  I  have  any- 
thing against  you,  which  I  have  not."  Then  he  made 
some  kind,  personal  remarks,  and  we  were  close  friends 
to  the  day  of  his  death. 

My  wife  is  of  Scotch  extraction  on  her  mother's  side, 
and  she  is  an  old-school  Presbyterian.  For  these  reasons 
she  and  Speaker  Henderson  became  fast  friends.  Once 
at  a  White  House  reception  they  were  arguing  politics. 
Henderson,  with  great  vehemence,  was  denouncing  Demo- 
crats in  general — and  Southern  Democrats  in  particular — 
whereupon  Mrs.  Clark  said:  "Mr.  Speaker,  you  ought 
not  to  be  so  hard  on  Democrats  and  Confederates.  If 
you  had  lived  down  South,  you  perhaps  would  have  been 
both." 

He  replied,  "I  don't  have  a  bit  of  doubt  about  it, 
madam,  not  a  bit.  I  always  stay  with  my  friends" — 
which  was  true,  and  which  was  one  of  the  causes  of  his 
wide-spread  popularity.  That  was  the  chief  reason  why 
he  pulled  through  the  Democratic  storm  of  1882  by  the 
skin  of  his  teeth,  when  the  Hawkeye  State  for  the  first 
and  last  time  since  the  close  of  the  Civil  War  sent  a  dele- 
gation to  the  House  a  majority  of  which  were  Democrats. 

Until  quite  recently  there  was  a  sort  of  glee  club  in  the 
House,  which  filled  up  the  long  waits  between  conference 
reports  on  the  last  night  of  a  session  with  songs,  such  as 
"He's  a  Jolly  Good  Fellow,"  "Tenting  on  the  Old  Camp 
Ground,"  "Old  Black  Joe,"  "'Way  Down  Upon  the 
Suwanee  River,"  "My  Country,  'Tis  of  Thee,"  and 
"Rally  Round  the  Flag,  Boys."  The  chief  singers  were 
Tawney  of  Minnesota,  Hamilton  of  Michigan,  Watson 
of  Indiana,  Burnett  of  Alabama,  and  Conry  of  New 
York.     Colonel    Henderson    helped    out   with    his    deep 


376   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

bass.  When  he  felt  Hke  perpetrating  a  solo  he  generally 
chose  "There's  a  Hole  in  the  Bottom  of  the  Sea/'  which 
he  rendered  with  great  eclat  from  both  House  and  gal- 
leries. These  musical  services  have  been  partially  dis- 
continued, because  death,  promotion,  and  accident  have 
removed  the  musicians. 

Henderson  possessed  a  really  magnificent  bass  voice, 
and  had  he  been  properly  trained  he  might  have  made 
fame  and  fortune  on  the  stage;  but  most  assuredly  if  he 
could  not  have  done  so  there  was  one  member  of  the 
Fifty-ninth  Congress  who  could  have  accomplished  that 
feat,  not  by  singing,  but  by  whistling. 

That  was  Hon.  Frank  Fulkerson,  of  St.  Joseph,  Mis- 
souri. He  is  perhaps  the  champion  whistler  of  the  world, 
and  can  imitate  any  bird,  animal,  or  musical  wind- 
instrument  whatsoever.  He  was  a  favorite  member  of 
the  House  glee  club,  and  on  his  last  night  in  the  House 
was  the  chief  performer;  but  alas  and  alack!  he  couldn't 
whistle  himself  into  a  second  term.  The  farmers  of  the 
Platte  Purchase  turned  deaf  ears  to  his  unequaled  whis- 
tling. 

Speaker  Henderson  was  one  of  the  most  grateful  of 
mortals.     He  never  forgot  a  man  who  did  him  a  kindness. 

For  nearly  ten  years  I  wrote  a  three-thousand-word 
weekly  letter  for  the  American  Press  Association.  Every 
Thursday  morning,  no  matter  where  I  was,  that  letter 
was  in  the  New  York  office.  They  stereotyped  it  and 
sold  the  plates,  accounting  to  me  monthly.  In  a  general 
way  it  was  to  be  a  Democratic  letter,  but  I  reserved  the 
right  to  write  on  any  subject  or  about  anybody,  just  as 
I  chose.  I  would  not  have  written  for  them  or  for  any- 
body else  on  any  other  terms. 

It  so  happened  that  there  was  a  rich  man  named  Miller 
who  secured  the  introduction  of  a  bill  into  the  House  in 
several  Congresses  making  it  unlawful  to  print  adver- 
tising matter  on  the  American  flag  or  to  use  the  flag  for 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  377 

advertising  purposes.  Miller  was  an  enthusiast  on  the 
subject,  and  made  a  hobby  of  his  bill.  While  Henderson 
was  chairman  of  the  Judiciary  Committee,  Miller's  bill 
was  referred  to  that  committee,  and  there  were  hearings 
on  it. 

Miller  alleged  that  on  one  occasion  Henderson  said: 
"I  hope  the  time  will  come  when  every  pound  of  meat 
shipped  from  this  country  will  be  wrapped  in  the  Ameri- 
can flag,  not  to  teach  foreigners  patriotism,  but  to  teach 
them  to  eat  American  meat,"  which  alleged  utterance 
made  Miller  hot  through  and  through.  So  he  got  him 
up  a  pamphlet  handsomely  printed  in  colors,  arguing  in 
favor  of  his  bill,  giving  extracts  from  speeches,  news- 
papers, and  interviews.  Among  other  things  he  quoted 
the  alleged  utterance  of  Henderson  and  proceeded  to 
dance  a  war-jig  on  him.  That  was  in  a  vacation  of  Con- 
gress. Things  political  being  dull  and  being  fond  of 
Henderson,  I  took  up  the  cudgels  in  his  defense  in  one  of 
my  syndicate  letters,  winding  up  by  declaring  that  it 
was  preposterous  for  Miller  or  anybody  else  to  undertake 
to  impeach  Colonel  Henderson's  patriotism,  because  he 
had  given  proof  conclusive  of  his  love  of  country  by 
losing  a  foot  at  Corinth  and  by  risking  his  life  on  a  score 
of  battle-fields. 

I  wrote  it  for  my  own  satisfaction,  never  supposing 
that  Henderson  would  see  it  and  never  dreaming  that 
he  would  one  day  be  Speaker.  It  turned  out,  however, 
that  the  Democratic  paper  in  Henderson's  home  city  of 
Dubuque  printed  my  letter  every  week.  Consequently 
Henderson  read  my  defense  of  him  against  Miller's 
assault,  took  his  pen  in  hand,  and  wrote  me  a  four-page 
letter  of  thanks,  which  was  hard  to  decipher,  but  which 
I  have  yet,  as  a  reminder  of  his  big,  generous  heart. 
From  that  day  to  the  hour  of  his  death  he  did  all  he  knew 
how  to  promote  my  fortunes.  It  is  a  pleasure  to  write 
or  think  of  him. 


378   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

One  of  the  most  pathetic  features  of  the  great  historic 
pageant  at  the  funeral  of  Hon.  Richard  Parks  Bland 
was  the  walking  together  of  United  States  Senator  James 
H.  Berry,  of  Arkansas,  and  Gen.  David  B.  Henderson, 
of  Iowa,  since  the  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representa- 
tives— Berry  on  his  crutches  and  Henderson  on  his  cork 
leg,  each  having  lost  a  leg  at  Corinth  on  the  same  day, 
the  one  in  the  Confederate  Army,  the  other  fighting  under 
the  starry  banner  of  the  Republic. 

General  Henderson's  spirit  of  good-fellowship  was 
handsomely  illustrated  as  we  rode  out  to  the  graveyard. 
Senator  Berry  discovered  that  somehow  he  had  lost  his 
pocketbook,  containing  all  his  cash  and  his  return  ticket. 
As  soon  as  this  fact  was  announced,  and  before  any  one 
else  could  offer  any  assistance,  Henderson  ran  his  hand 
down  in  his  pocket,  pulled  out  a  roll  of  greenbacks, 
counted  out  three  ten-dollar  bills,  and  in  spite  of  Berry's 
protest  forced  him  to  take  them.  There  was  genuine 
American  brotherhood  for  you! 

It  is  rare  that  any  utterance  of  a  Speaker  of  the  House, 
while  actually  occupying  the  chair,  is  flavored  with  humor 
or  spiced  with  wit.  Mr.  Reed  indulged  his  penchant  in 
that  regard  very  gingerly  while  presiding,  though  occa- 
sionally he  could  not  resist  the  temptation.  The  same 
is  true  of  Speaker  Henderson.  In  the  closing  days  of 
the  first  session  of  the  Fifty-sixth  Congress  the  House  was 
obstreperous,  and  Speaker  Henderson  pounded  the  desk 
with  his  gavel  until  his  right  arm  must  have  been  sore 
for  a  week  after  final  adjournment.  When  the  House 
was  in  a  most  uproarious  mood,  Hon.  Page  Morris,  of 
Duluth,  began  to  speak  in  a  very  low  tone.  Hon.  John 
J.  Lentz,  of  Ohio,  arose  to  a  question  of  order,  stating 
that  he  couldn't  hear  what  Morris  was  saying.  That 
point  had  been  made  so  often  that  day  that  Speaker 
Henderson's  patience  was  threadbare. 

He  gave  his  desk  a  thundering  whack  and,  looking  at 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  sW 

Lentz,  said:  "I  can  give  you  order";  then,  looking  at 
Morris,  roared,  "but  I  can't  give  you  lungs!"  That  sally 
put  everybody  in  a  fine  humor,  and  order  was  restored. 

Strange  things  happen  toward  the  close  of  a  session. 
For  instance,  Tuesday,  June  5,  1900,  was  made  by  legis- 
lative fiction  to  include  Wednesday,  June  6th,  so  far  as 
the  House  record  was  concerned.  According  to  my  way 
of  thinking,  as  the  legislative  day  of  June  6th  began,  theo- 
retically, at  least,  at  noon,  it  was  necessary  for  the  House 
to  go  through  the  performance  of  adjourning  at  that 
hour,  if  for  no  more  than  a  second,  and  formally  to  begin 
the  legislative  day  of  June  6th,  but  the  House  continued 
in  session  past  twelve. 

About  I  P.M.,  June  6th,  being  still  in  operation  as 
June  5th,  I  rose  to  a  question  of  order  and  said:  "Mr. 
Speaker,  is  this  yesterday  or  to-day?  Under  the  rules 
were  we  not  bound  to  adjourn  at  twelve,  meridian?" 

"Oh  no,"  replied  Speaker  Henderson.  "It  is  all  right. 
Legislatively  speaking,  this  is  yesterday,  but  by  the  cal- 
endar it  is  to-day!"  which  was  received  with  laughter 
and  applause. 

'Most  everybody  knows  that  General  Henderson  lost  a 
leg  during  the  Civil  War,  but  very  few  know  that  by 
reason  of  some  disease  of  the  bone  he  was  compelled  to 
have  that  leg,  or  portions  of  it,  amputated  five  or  six 
times.  Beginning  just  above  the  ankle,  the  surgeons 
cut  off  his  leg  piecemeal  until  they  nearly  reached  the 
hip-joint.  Few  soldiers  ever  suffered  more  physical 
agony  from  wounds  received  in  battle  than  did  General 
Henderson.  Nevertheless,  he  was  as  great  a  lover  of 
peace  as  was  Sir  Robert  Walpole.  Some  years  ago  Hen- 
derson was  the  orator-in-chief  at  a  national  encampment 
of  the  Grand  Army  of  the  Republic,  at  Indianapolis,  and 
began  his  address  with  this  splendid  sentence:  "My 
theme  to-night  is  war;  I  hate  it."  That  mot  would 
form  a  fitting  epitaph  for  this  citizen-soldier. 


38o  MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

At  the  end  of  a  session  most  of  the  tilts,  hard  knocks, 
unpleasant  episodes,  and  ugly  scenes  are  forgotten,  and 
everybody  seems  disposed  to  jollify.  In  the  interludes 
of  business,  while  waiting  for  conference  reports,  members 
musically  inclined  congregate  in  the  area  in  front  of  the 
Speaker's  stand  and  sing  popular  songs. 

On  June  7,  1900,  the  boys  were  singing,  and  when  the 
Speaker  came  in  to  adjourn  the  House  they  began  to 
sing  "The  Speaker's  a  Jolly  Good  Fellow."  That 
touched  his  big  heart.  He  ascended  to  his  place,  gave 
his  desk  a  whack,  and  then,  with  a  tear  in  his  eye  and  a 
smile  on  his  face,  said,  "The  choir  will  come  to  order; 
likewise  the  House." 

The  committee  appointed  to  wait  on  the  President,  to 
inform  him  that  the  House  was  ready  to  adjourn,  hav- 
ing reported.  Speaker  Henderson  delivered  this  neat 
and  cordial  valedictory,  thoroughly  characteristic  of  the 
man: 

"Gentlemen  of  the  House  of  Representatives,  we  will 
in  a  few  moments  complete  our  session's  work.  It  has 
been  a  session  of  earnest,  patriotic  effort,  of  unremitting 
toil.  This  House  has  demonstrated  that  men  may  meet 
on  great  fields  of  contest  and  part  as  friends.  This  body 
has  considered  many  great,  novel,  national  questions. 
That  fervor  which  enters  into  debate  on  the  eve  of  a 
great  national  conflict  has  been  present,  but  guided  by 
intelligence  and  manly  courage. 

"At  the  opening  of  this  session  I  took  this  chair  with 
that  fear  and  apprehension  which  every  conscientious 
man  should  feel.  I  appealed  to  you  for  support  and 
kindly  aid.  Not  for  one  moment  have  you  forgotten  that 
appeal.  Your  sustaining  influence  has  made  it  possible  to 
consider  these  mighty  problems  of  the  hour  and  never 
allow  the  legislator  and  the  gentleman  to  sink  below  the 
high  level  of  manhood. 

"In  parting,  I  wish  you  from  my  heart  a  pleasant  vaca- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  .381 

tion,  and  hope  that  you  may  all  return  to  the  duties  of  the 
next  session  refreshed  in  body  and  in  mind.*' 

Did  Speaker  Henderson  exert  much  influence  in  legis- 
lation? My  answer,  from  observation,  is  that  he  did. 
In  my  judgment  the  Porto-Rican  Tariff  bill  never  would 
have  passed  the  House  except  for  his  influence. 

When  I  was  Democratic  minority  leader  I  accidentally 
learned  how  to  poll  the  House  in  the  easiest,  best,  and 
most  accurate  way  possible.  During  the  Christmas  holi- 
days most  of  the  members  leave  Washington.  The  few 
who  remain  then  have  a  golden  opportunity  to  break  into 
print.  In  the  holiday  season  of  1908-09,  while  the 
Payne-Aldrich-Smoot  Tariff  bill  was  in  the  process  of  in- 
cubation, and  while  news  items  were  scarce  as  hen's 
teeth  or  angels'  visits,  it  popped  into  the  head  of  some 
newspaper  correspondent  to  discover  whether  the  Demo- 
cratic members  of  the  Ways  and  Means  Committee  in- 
tended to  offer  a  substitute  Tariff  bill.  So  he  went  around 
interviewing  members.  By  some  strange  mishap,  he 
never  succeeded  in  interrogating  any  Democratic  member 
of  the  Committee  on  Ways  and  Means,  who  would  be 
compelled  to  do  the  work  of  preparing  a  substitute  Tariff 
bill,  if  any  such  substitute  was  to  be  offered ;  but  among 
others  who  yielded  to  his  invitation  to  illuminate  the 
question  was  Representative  Henry  D.  Clayton,  subse- 
quently chairman  of  the  great  Committee  on  the  Judiciary 
and  now  a  Federal  judge.  He  gave  out  a  flaming  inter- 
view, declaring  that  we  would  offer  a  substitute  Tariff 
bill,  covering  every  item  from  "agate  to  zinc."  The  last 
three  words  were  winged  words,  and  were  head-lined  in 
every  newspaper  in  the  land,  and  this  interview  reached 
into  the  remotest  comers  of  the  country. 

The  papers  hammered  on  it  until  a  great  uproar  was 
created — in  fact,  a  perfect  furor  outside  of  Congress — 
and  a  vast  volume  of  talk  in  Congress.  It  was  the  re- 
sounding theme  of  every  tongue.    Of  course  such  a  thing 


382   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

was  unheard  of  till  then.  Moreover,  it  would  entail  a 
vast  amount  of  labor,  investigation,  and  trouble.  In  ad- 
dition to  all  that,  if  we  offered  a  substitute  Tariff  bill  the 
Republican  majority,  instead  of  defending  their  own  bill, 
would  attack  our  bill.  However  that  may  be,  the  talk 
was  so  persistent  that,  as  the  top  Democrat  on  Ways  and 
Means  as  well  as  minority  leader,  I  concluded  that  it  was 
my  duty,  in  both  capacities,  to  find  out  what  the  Demo- 
cratic sentiment  of  the  House  was  on  that  important 
question. 

So,  by  accident,  I  hit  on  this  plan:  I  wrote  the  dean 
of  each  Democratic  delegation  and  asked  him  to  convene 
his  delegation  and  poll  them  on  the  question  of  a  substitute 
Tariff  bill,  stating  that  while  it  would  entail  much  labor 
on  the  Democratic  members  of  Ways  and  Means,  we 
were  willing  to  do  the  work  if  the  House  Democrats  so 
desired. 

Being  myself  the  dean  of  the  Missouri  delegation,  I 
called  a  meeting  of  it.  When  we  had  assembled  I  stated 
the  reason  for  the  call  and  asked  them  how  they  stood. 
At  first  all  except  one  was  enthusiastically  in  favor  of  a 
substitute  Tariff  bill.  I  told  them  that,  that  being  the 
case,  I  desired  to  know  their  opinions  as  to  the  tariff  rates 
on  the  various  multitudinous  items.  First,  I  asked  what 
rate  they  wished  on  zinc,  lead,  and  iron.  Three  of  them 
quit  suddenly.  I  then  asked  what  rate  they  suggested 
on  lumber.  Two  more  kicked  over  the  traces.  I  then 
asked  what  tariff  they  thought  should  be  levied  on  wool. 
Three  more  reneged.  In  an  hour  they  left  me  alone  in 
my  glory— every  one  of  them  being  against  a  substitute 
Tariff  bill!  The  deans  made  their  reports  to  me,  showing 
the  Democrats  to  be  opposed — two  to  one — to  a  substi- 
tute Tariff  bill,  and  that  was  the  last  of  it. 

The  plan  of  polling  the  state  delegations  separately 
possesses  this  vast  advantage  over  a  general  caucus:  As 
^  rul^  the  members  from  a  state  have  something  of  ^ 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  383 

community  of  thought  and  interest.  It  is  a  private  per- 
formance in  which  the  newspapers  are  not  interested. 
The  members  sit  down  and  reason  calmly  together.  No 
inflammatory  speeches  are  made  in  the  presence  of  a 
large  number  of  persons.  No  extravagant  promises  or 
threats  are  made  in  the  heat  of  debate,  which  they  think 
that  they  must  stick  to,  right  or  wrong,  out  of  self-respect. 
No  wounds  are  made  into  which  salt  may  be  rubbed. 

A  great  many  folks,  including  Representatives  in  Con- 
gress, are  of  the  same  mental  habit  as  the  man  who,  by 
a  slip  of  the  tongue,  declared  a  horse  was  seventeen  feet 
high  instead  of  seventeen  hands  high,  and  through  pride 
of  opinion  stuck  to  it  for  evermore.  Pride  works  tre- 
mendous results  in  this  world.  Alexander  Pope  was 
within  the  shadow  of  a  great  truth  when  he  wrote : 

What  the  weak  head  with  strongest  bias  rules 
Is  pride,  the  never-failing  vice  of  fools. 

Ever  since  my  experience  with  the  substitute  Tariff  bill, 
whenever  I  have  desired  very  much  to  know  the  Demo- 
cratic opinion  of  the  House,  I  have  had  it  polled  by  dele- 
gations. The  last  time  I  tried  it  was  in  the  last  days  of 
the  Sixty-third  Congress,  on  the  Shipping  bill.  President 
Wilson  was  in  sore  distress  about  it,  and  one  night  he 
came  out  to  my  house  to  see  me.  He  told  me  his  troubles, 
gave  me  his  views  at  length,  and  I  gave  him  mine.  He 
finally  asked  me  if  it  could  be  put  through  the  House 
caucus.  I  replied  that  I  did  not  know,  as  I  had  paid  no 
attention  to  it,  but  that  I  had  learned  by  hearing  bits  of 
conversation  that  there  was  much  opposition  to  it. 

Then  President  Wilson  asked  if  I  thought  that,  in  the 
event  of  its  being  indorsed  by  the  caucus,  it  would  pass 
the  House.  I  made  the  same  reply.  I  then  told  him 
that  in  forty-eight  hours  I  could  ascertain  with  something 
approximating   certainty  the  answer   both  as  to  caucus 


384   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

and  House,  if  he  so  desired — ^which  he  did.  Within  the 
forty-eight  hours  I  wrote  him  that  it  could  be  passed 
through  the  caucus  after  a  bloody  fight — and  it  was 
bloody,  sure  enough — and  that  it  could  be  passed  through 
the  House  after  another  bloody  fight. 

It  turned  out  that  my  diagnosis  was  absolutely  correct. 
The  caucus  which  considered  that  bill  lasted  till  the 
chickens  were  crowing  for  day,  and  was  of  the  old-fash- 
ioned Kilkenny  cat  variety,  the  only  one  of  that  bad  and 
bloody  sort  which  we  have  had  in  nine  years. 

Though  it  passed  the  House,  the  bill  did  not  become  a 
law  in  that  Congress — more's  the  pity. 

I  hope  that  my  illustrious  friend,  Judge  Henry  D. 
Clayton,  may  live  many  years  full  of  happiness  and  pros- 
perity, but  if  he  reaches  the  age  of  Methuselah  and  is 
interviewed  every  day,  the  chances  are  a  thousand  to 
one  that  he  will  never  utter  any  three  words  which  will 
be  so  widely  quoted  or  create  such  a  hubbub  as  did  his 
**  agate  to  zinc." 

MY  FIRST  TAMMANY  HALL  SPEECH 

Of  all  the  experiences  of  my  life  prior  to  being  sworn 
into  Congress,  the  one  which  created  the  most  comment, 
and  for  which  I  was  most  praised  as  well  as  most  criti- 
cized, was  the  delivery  of  a  speech  in  Tammany  Hall, 
July  4,  1893.  The  newspaper  comments  ranged  all  the 
way  from  suggestions  that  I  would  some  day  be  Presi- 
dent to  comparisons  with  Jesse  James — certainly  a  suffi- 
ciently extended  range  to  please  most  folks. 

It  came  about  in  this  wise:  Early  in  June  I  received 
an  engraved  invitation,  signed  by  the  Big  Four  of  the 
Wigwam,  to  be  present  on  the  birthday  of  the  Republic 
and  make  a  "short  speech.''  I  doubted  the  advisability 
of  going,  but  my  wife  insisted  that  it  would  turn  out  well. 
So  I  replied  that  if  the  invitation  was  more  than  a  stock 


MRS.    CHAMP   CLARK 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  385 

invitation  to  all  new  Democratic  Congressmen,  and  if  I 
supposed  they  really  wanted  me,  I  would  accept,  inas- 
much as  I  would  be  in  Washington  about  that  time  on 
public  business. 

When  I  left  my  Missouri  home  in  the  last  days  of  June 
I  had  not  heard  from  them,  and  asked  my  wife  to  forward 
their  answer,  if  any  came,  to  my  Washington  address, 
which  she  did.  I  received  it  July  ist.  En  route  having 
abundant  leisure,  I  had  written  a  brief  speech  on  "The 
Trans-Missouri  Democracy,"  but  when,  upon  the  receipt 
of  their  letter,  I  looked  for  my  manuscript,  to  my  dismay 
and  disgust  I  discovered  that  I  had  lost  it. 

As  I  was  desirous  of  sending  proofs  to  friendly  home 
newspapers — never  dreaming  that  any  New  York  paper 
would  publish  it — I  secured  a  pencil  and  scratch-block, 
hunted  up  a  job  printing-office,  chartered  a  messenger- 
boy,  and  sent  the  speech  to  my  printer,  sheet  by  sheet, 
as  fast  as  I  could  write  it,  reproducing  the  lost  speech 
from  memory  as  nearly  as  possible.  By  night  I  had  the 
proofs  in  the  mail  for  home  consumption.  In  the  mean 
time  I  notified  the  committee  that  I  accepted  their  kind 
invitation.  They  replied,  asking  when  I  would  arrive 
and  where  I  would  stop.  I  replied  that  I  would  stop  at 
the  Hoffman  House,  arriving  via  the  Pennsylvania  road 
at  such  an  hour  on  the  3d.  Nobody  met  me  at  the 
depot  or  hotel. 

I  registered  and  asked  their  prices. 

"Two  dollars  a  day  and  up,"  replied  the  swell  clerk. 

"Are  meals  included?"  I  timidly  inquired. 

"No!"  snapped  His  Royal  Highness.  I  felt  abashed  in 
that  august  presence,  and  I  took  a  two-dollar  room  up  close 
to  the  rafters. 

My  utter  greenness  as  to  prices  in  New  York  must  be 
charged  up  to  the  fact  that  that  was  my  first  visit  to  that 
delectable  city.  I  felt  very  lonesome  and  came  near 
taking  the  first  train  for  the  West.     Having  several  hours 

Vou  I.— 23 


386   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

of  daylight  left,  I  went  up  to  my  little  room,  where  it  was 
stuffy  and  intensely  hot,  pulled  off  my  outer  clothing, 
lay  down  on  the  bed,  and  began  committing  my  speech 
to  memory.  At  dusk  I  went  down  to  the  street,  hunted 
up  a  humble  restaurant,  and  ate  a  modest  supper.  After 
that  I  went  back  to  my  tiny  room,  stripped,  put  on  my 
nightshirt,  and  went  at  my  speech  again. 

About  eleven  o'clock  a  colored  bell-boy  poked  his  head 
in  the  doorway  and  said,  "Some  gemmen  wants  to  see 
you,  Mustuh  Clark.'*  I  told  him  that  I  had  gone  to  bed, 
but  to  tell  them  to  come  up.  They  did  so — a  quartet 
of  royal  souls — Col.  John  R.  Fellows,  Amos  J.  Cummings, 
"Little  Phil"  Thompson,  and  Tom  Coakley.  So  I  re- 
ceived two  Congressmen  and  one  ex-Congressman  in  my 
"nightie,"  just  as  George  M.  Dallas  received  the  dele- 
gation which  notified  him  of  his  nomination  for  the  Vice- 
Presidency. 

Their  jolly  laughter  dispelled  the  gloom  into  which  I 
had  fallen  by  reason  of  what  I  considered  neglect.  As 
soon  as  they  had  introduced  themselves  Colonel  Fellows 
asked,  "Why  are  you  up  here  in  this  cubbyhole?" 

I  replied,  "Because  I  do  not  want  to  go  broke  on  hotel 
bills." 

He  said,  "You  are  Tammany's  guest  while  here  and 
you  don't  pay  a  blamed  cent. "  Then  turning  to  the  bell- 
boy he  roared:  "Go  tell  that  upstart  of  a  clerk  to  move 
Mr.  Clark  into  such  and  such  a  suite" — a  suite  big 
enough  to  have  housed  Brigham  Young  and  all  his  wives. 

As  soon  as  I  could  dress,  the  five  of  us  repaired  thither. 
Colonel  Fellows  was  hotly  criticizing  his  friend,  "Private" 
John  Allen,  of  Mississippi,  who  was  on  the  program  for 
a  "long  talk,"  for  failing  them  at  the  last  minute.  He 
swore  that  without  Allen  the  Fourth-of-July  oratory  would 
be  dry  as  a  powder-house.  What  was  equally  unfortu- 
nate, so  the  colonel  alleged,  was  that  there  was  no  one 
else  available  as  a  substitute  for  John,  to  deliver  a  "long 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  387 

talk."  I  bashfully  inquired  what  they  considered  a 
"short  talk"  and  a  "long  talk." 

Colonel  Fell'^ws  said  that  the  Hmit  on  a  "short  talk" 
was  ten  minutcis,  and  a  "long  talk"  thirty.  So  they 
substituted  me  in  place  of  Allen  for  a  "long  talk." 

As  they  were  leaving  the  room  I  called  Mr.  Thompson 
back.  Though  I  had  never  seen  him  before,  I  knew  all 
about  him.  His  father  and  mine  were  old-time  friends, 
and  he  was  among  those  I  cast  my  first  vote  for  when  he 
was  a  candidate  for  Circuit  attorney  in  Kentucky.  I 
told  him  that  my  speech  presented,  without  hedging,  the 
views  of  Western  Democrats  as  compared  with  the  views 
of  Eastern  Democrats,  much  to  the  advantage  of  the 
Westerners,  particularly  on  the  coinage  question,  which 
was  then  a  burning  issue;  that  I  was  determined  to  de- 
liver it,  and  wound  up  by  asking  him  to  read  it  and  tell 
me  how  he  thought  it  would  be  received,  as  I  had  never 
spoken  in  the  East.  He  hastily  read  the  speech,  which 
contained  not  a  scintilla  of  wit  or  humor. 

After  perusing  it  he  said,  "Your  views  are  forcibly 
stated,  and  some  of  them  will  not  please  your  audience; 
but  I  understand  you  can  tell  an  anecdote  well."  I  re- 
plied with  becoming  modesty  that  I  had  some  local  repu- 
tation in  that  regard.  He  then  said  that  if  I  would  begin 
my  speech  with  a  couple  of  good  anecdotes,  and  edge  in 
one  occasionally,  they  would  receive  my  speech  all  right. 

PhiHp  B.  Thompson,  Jr. — "Little  Phil,"  as  he  was 
universally  called  in  Kentucky,  to  differentiate  him  from 
his  father,  Philip  B.  Thompson,  Sr. — ^was  a  brave  boy- 
soldier,  a  brilliant  lawyer,  and  an  eloquent  speaker.  He 
was  a  successful  Circuit  attorney  and  a  prominent  Repre- 
sentative in  Congress.  He  had  one  unique  experience, 
and  another  of  the  most  thrilling  nature.  His  father, 
himself,  and  his  twin  brother,  John  B.,  Jr.,  served  together 
in  Gen.  John  H.  Morgan's  Confederate  cavalry.  The 
father  made  one  of  his  sons  march  at  the  head  of  the 


388   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

column,  the  other  at  the  rear,  so  that  they  would  not 
both  be  killed  or  injured  at  once.  Happily  none  of  the 
three  received  a  scratch. 

He  was  one  of  the  participants  in  the  most  remarkable 
fight  that  ever  took  place  in  a  court-house.  During  the 
trial  of  a  case  in  the  Circuit  Court-room  at  Harrodsburg, 
Kentucky,  he,  his  twin  brother,  and  his  father  shot  and 
killed  old  man  Davis  and  his  two  sons — a  performance 
unparalleled  in  all  the  bloody  annals  of  America. 

All  six  were  shooting  simultaneously  in  that  crowded 
room.  People  got  under  the  benches  and  sought  safety 
wherever  they  thought  they  could  find  it,  some  jumping 
through  the  windows,  taking  the  sashes  with  them. 
The  presiding  judge,  Wickliff,  huddled  down  behind 
the  judge's  stand.  While  this  fusillade  was  in  progress 
Col.  John  B.  Thompson,  Sr.,  ex-Lieutenant-Governor, 
ex-Representative  in  Congress,  and  ex-United  States 
Senator,  brother  to  "Old  Phil"  and  uncle  to  "Little 
Phil,"  stood  in  the  aisle  jerking  his  head  by  reason  of 
palsy.  When  the  shooting  ceased,  somebody  asked  him 
why  he  didn't  get  under  a  bench,  as  the  others  did. 
He  replied,  laconically,  "Because  all  the  places  had 
been  taken!" — an  explanation  which  explained. 

Col.  John  R.  Fellows,  who  was  a  rare  and  radiant  ora- 
tor, was  an  Arkansas  lawyer  and  soldier,  one  of  the  most 
successful  among  the  pioneer  Southerners  who  at  the 
close  of  the  Civil  War  moved  on  New  York  in  quest  of 
ventures  and  to  seek  their  fortunes.  He  was  one  of 
Mr.  Croker's  favorites,  and  held  high  office  for  many 
years — revolving  out  of  one  good  berth  into  another — 
and  generally  a  better  one. 

Amos  J.  Cummings  was  one  of  the  most  popular  men 
I  have  ever  known.     Fitz-Greene  Halleck's  fine  lines — 


None  knew  him  but  to  love  him, 
None  named  him  but  to  praise-^ 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  389 

were  really  true  as  to  Cummings.  He  had  filibustered  in 
Nicaragua  with  General  Walker,  yclept  by  his  followers 
"the  Gray-eyed  Man  of  Destiny,"  who  ended  by  being 
lined  up  against  a  dead  wall  and  shot;  Cummings  truthfully 
boasted  that  he  had  set  type  in  every  state  in  the  Union; 
learned  to  be  an  editor  under  Horace  Greeley  and  Charles 
A.  Dana;  served  four  years  in  the  Army  of  the  Potomac; 
and  finally  was  a  successful  lecturer  and  Representative 
in  Congress.  Throughout  his  varied  and  exciting  expe- 
riences his  heart  had  remained  tender  as  a  little  child's, 
and  he  was  to  the  end  a  lover  of  his  kind.  His  military 
hero  was  George  B.  McClellan  and  his  hero  among  states- 
men was  Mr.  Speaker  Samuel  J.  Randall.  Had  Cum- 
mings lived  to  hear  President  Theodore  Roosevelt  dedi- 
cate Antietam  as  a  national  park,  and  speak  an  hour 
without  once  mentioning  "Little  Mac,"  the  victor  of  that 
bloody  field,  there  is  no  telling  what  Cummings  would 
have  done  to  that  soldier,  statesman,  traveler,  discoverer, 
hunter,  politician,  and  author. 

But  to  return  to  our  mutton.  There  was  a  monster  audi- 
ence in  Tammany  Hall  on  the  Fourth  including  many 
men  of  prominence  in  every  walk  of  Hfe.  On  the  pro- 
gram ahead  of  me  were  Mr.  Speaker  Crisp  and  Congress- 
man Benton  McMillan.  Crisp's  fame  was  nation-wide. 
When  the  band  had  played  "The  Star-spangled  Banner" 
and  he  was  introduced,  that  vast  multitude  rose  up  as 
one  man  and  applauded  for  fully  five  minutes  before  he 
was  permitted  to  begin.  As  he  always  did,  he  delivered 
a  sound,  sensible  Democratic  speech,  and  was  liberally 
applauded  at  the  close. 

Then  came  Benton  McMillan,  not  so  famous  as  Mr. 
Speaker  Crisp,  but  a  veteran  statesman  with  a  splen- 
did reputation  and  exceedingly  popular  with  the  Tam- 
many braves.     The  great  Tennesseean  is  a  fine  figure  of 

man,  and  standing  before  that  enthusiastic  multitude, 

hile  the  band  played  "Dixie"  and  the  crowd  shouted 


390   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

itself  hoarse,  he  seemed  happy  as  a  clam  at  high 
tide. 

Having  applauded  Crisp  five  minutes,  they  applauded 
Benton  McMillan  three.  He  sailed  in  and  made  a  ringing, 
rabble-rousing,  old-fashioned  Democratic  stump  speech, 
in  which  species  of  oratory  he  is  a  past-master. 

When  he  had  concluded  I  was  introduced.  The  audi- 
ence applauded  me  for  about  one  minute  in  feeble  and 
perfunctory  fashion.  The  band  played  "My  Old  Ken- 
tucky Home."  I  did  not  really  know  a  soul  in  that  vast 
audience,  and  I  had  stage-fright  so  bad  that  I  thought 
my  tongue  would  cleave  to  the  roof  of  my  mouth  in 
spite  of  all  I  could  do,  and  wished  most  heartily  that  I 
had  declined  the  invitation  to  speak. 

While  the  band  was  playing,  a  Missourian  down  at 
the  reporters'  table  sent  me  this  encouraging  note:  "Go 
in  and  speak  as  you  would  at  a  picnic  in  the  woods  in 
Missouri  and  you  will  make  a  national  reputation!" 

At  last  the  band  rested  from  its  labors.  My  stage- 
fright  bothered  me  very  much  at  first,  but,  following 
"Little  Phirs"  advice,  I  began  with  two  fetching  anec- 
dotes which  set  the  braves  to  whooping  and  yelling 
tumultuously.  My  stage-fright  vanished  as  suddenly  as 
it  had  come  on,  and  in  five  minutes  I  felt  as  much  at  home 
as  if  I  had  been  addressing  a  jury  in  my  own  town. 

In  all  my  Hfe  I  have  never  delivered  a  speech  in  better 
style.  The  audience  applauded  rapturously  everything 
worth  applauding,  and  a  good  many  things  that  were 
not,  but  when  I  was  eulogizing  the  Trans-Mississippi 
Democrats,  telling  them  how  we  had  been  treated  by 
the  party  as  stepchildren,  and  how  we  intended  to  lord 
it  over  them  in  the  days  to  come,  they  acted  as  though 
they  had  been  treated  to  an  ice  bath.  Then  I  would 
throw  in  something  by  way  of  praise  of  Tammany  Demo- 
crats, and  they  would  yell  like  so  many  Comanches. 

While  I  was  at  the  height  of  my  eulogy  on  the  Trans- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  391 

Mississippi  Democracy — especially  the  Missouri  De- 
mocracy— a  policeman  as  big  as  the  Kentucky  giant, 
sitting  in  the  mouth  of  the  aisle  farthest  from  me,  could 
stand  it  no  longer,  and  bawled  in  a  stentorian  voice, 
"What  about  New  Yorruck?"  I  replied,  gHbly,  "New 
York  is  all  right  when  it  is  right,  but  the  trouble  is  she 
is  wrong  about  half  the  time.  On  the  night  of  the  elec- 
tion the  whole  country  inquires,  *How  did  New  York 
go?'  whereas  nobody  takes  the  trouble  to  ask,  *How  did 
Missouri  go?'  Their  inquiry  is,  *What  is  Missouri's 
Democratic  majority  ? ' " 

That  put  my  interrogator  out  of  business.  I  have 
always  thought  that  I  owed  an  apology  to  my  inquisitive 
policeman,  and  would  have  sent  him  one  had  I  known 
his  address.  At  the  next  election  Missouri  went  Re- 
publican. 

During  my  speech  I  noticed  that  a  very  tall,  good- 
looking  man  with  a  preacher's  coat  and  collar,  sitting  in 
the  seventh  row  of  seats,  invariably  led  the  applause 
for  me. 

The  managers  invited  me  into  the  basement  of  the 
Fourteenth  Street  wigwam  to  luncheon,  after  the  exer- 
cises were  over.  In  the  basement  I  saw  my  clerical- 
coated  friend  standing  in  the  middle  of  the  room,  assidu- 
ously stowing  the  refreshments  away. 

I  walked  up  to  him  and  said:  "My  friend,  I  noticed 
you  led  the  applause  for  me,  and  I  would  like  to  know 
who  you  are."  He  replied,  "I  am  the  Reverend  Mr. 
Forbush,  rector  of  the  Episcopal  church  at  Poughkeep- 
sie,  but  I  was  born  and  reared  near  Middletown,  Mont- 
gomery County,  Missouri,  in  your  district,  and  I  am 
down  to  New  York  for  the  sole  purpose  of  hearing  you 
speak!" 

He  was  a  gracious  and  kindly  gentleman  and  by  his 
applause  helped  me  through  that  day's  performance. 

Being  from  the  rural  districts,  I  naturally  arose  earlier 


392   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

next  morning  than  most  New-Yorkers,  went  over  into 
Madison  Square  Park,  and  sat  on  an  iron  bench,  watching 
the  antics  of  the  squirrels  in  the  lovely  trees,  wondering 
anxiously  what  the  New  York  papers  would  say  about 
my  speech.  My  expectations  were  very  moderate.  I 
thought  a  notice  of  ten  lines  would  be  about  the  limit. 
I  hoped  it  would  be  favorable,  but  entertained  grave 
doubts  on  that  head.  I  was  thinking  deeply  as  to  what 
my  Democratic  enemies  in  my  badly  factionalized  dis~ 
trict  would  do  to  me  if  my  speech  was  pronounced  a 
failure.  At  last  a  boy  came  through  the  park  with  an 
armful  of  papers,  and  I  said:  "Young  man,  what  papers 
have  you?" 

He  answered:  "All  of  them." 

I  bought  one  of  each.  The  first  my  eye  fell  on  was  The 
New  York  World,  with  great  flaring  black  lines  at  the  top 
of  the  first  column,  first  page,  which  ran  in  this  wise: 
"Hark  to  Champ  Clark!"  followed  by  several  columns 
of  descriptive  matter,  cartoons,  and  the  complete  text  of 
my  speech.  Most  of  the  other  New  York  papers  gave 
me  considerable  space.  Later  The  St.  Louis  Republic 
hailed  it  as  "A  Key-note  Speech,"  and  it  was  head-lined 
throughout  the  land. 

Such  is  a  brief  account  of  my  first  appearance  and 
reception  in  the  American  metropolis.  At  first  the 
Eastern  papers  regarded  it  merely  as  a  "funny  speech," 
by  reason  of  the  anecdotes  which  Phil  Thompson  induced 
me  to  put  into  it,  and  spoke  pleasantly  of  it;  but  when 
they  came  to  realize  its  serious  import  as  to  the  hopes, 
intentions,  and  ambitions  of  Western  Democrats — a 
prophecy  of  their  domination  of  the  party — they  began 
to  abuse  me,  and  some  of  them  have  kept  it  up  to  this 
day. 

The  New  York  Sun,  in  order  to  prove  me  to  be  an 
ignoramus,  actually  suppressed  half  a  sentence  in  my 
speech?  which  malicious  suppressipn  m^de  the  other  half 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  393 

bad  grammar!  Such  a  performance  is  a  disgrace  to  Amer- 
ican journalism. 

It  has  been  thought  by  divers  and  sundry  persons  that 
my  Tammany  Hall  speech  set  in  motion,  or  at  least  gave 
impetus  to,  Western  Democratic  ideas,  and  drew  the  lines 
for  the  great  contest  of  1896.  At  any  rate,  the  ideas 
which  I  enunciated  that  day  were  incorporated  into  the 
1896  Chicago  platform,  on  which  that  historic  battle  was 
fought. 

In  the  retrospect  I  think  that  the  most  pleasing  result 
of  that  speech  was  the  Hfelong  friendship  of  Amos  Cum- 
mings.  Colonel  Fellows,  and  "Little  Phir'  Thompson. 

Perhaps  the  most  amusing  incident  pertaining  to  that 
trip  was  that  before  leaving  the  capital  I  asked  a  news- 
paper man  of  my  acquaintance,  and  from  Missouri,  but 
who  was  not  very  friendly  and  was  in  a  bad  humor  about 
something  or  other,  what  was  a  good  hotel  in  New  York. 
He  inquired  why  I  was  going  to  New  York,  and  I  told  him 
that  I  had  been  invited  to  make  a  Fourth-of-July  speech 
in  Tammany  Hall;  whereupon  he  soothingly  remarked, 
"A  new  Congressman  amounts  to  precious  little  in  Wash- 
ington and  to  nothing  at  all  in  New  York!" 

Although  he  represented  the  largest  Democratic  daily 
in  Missouri,  he  never  asked  me  a  word  about  my  speech, 
and  I  did  not  vouchsafe  any  information  or  tender  him 
an  advance  copy.  No  doubt  he  was  as  much  surprised 
as  I  was  to  find  that  my  speech  was  telegraphed  in  full 
from  New  York  to  his  own  paper  in  Missouri,  and  pub- 
Hshed  on  the  front  page  with  big,  flaring  head-lines, 
together  with  my  picture,  and  an  elaborate  editorial 
notice  of  the  most  laudatory  character.  He  certainly 
did  not  achieve  a  scoop  on  that  occasion,  but  I  pondered 
his  mot  as  to  the  little  importance  attaching  to  the  new 
members,  and  entered  upon  my  duties  at  the  extra  ses- 
sion in  August  prepared  to  be  cold-shouldered  by  what 
Colonel  Cochran,  of  St.  Joseph,  Missouri,  w^s  wont  to 


394   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

denominate  "the  old  and  experienced  members" — and  I 
was! 

Col.  John  A.  Ely,  a  native  of  Missouri,  now  a  Demo- 
cratic leader  in  the  land  of  the  Dakotas,  once  became 
so  sick  that  the  doctors  gave  him  up,  and  informed 
him  that  if  he  had  any  farewell  messages  to  deliver,  or 
any  final  arrangements  to  make  toward  setting  his 
house  in  order,  he  had  better  be  about  it,  for  his  time 
was  brief.  Whereupon  the  colonel  amazed  his  intimates 
by  preferring  this  strange  request:  "Be  sure  to  bury  me 
in  the  Swedish  graveyard." 

A  long  time  he  was  suspended  between  heaven  and 
earth,  and  his  friends  nearly  worked  themselves  into  ver- 
tigo trying  to  solve  the  problem  of  why  he  had  chosen 
that  particular  place  of  sepulture,  for  they  knew  that 
while  in  health  he  and  the  Scandinavians,  who  were  gen- 
erally stalwart  Republicans,  had  not  been  enamoured  of 
one  another. 

One  night,  just  as  he  began  to  show  signs  of  recovery. 
Col.  Reuben  C.  Pew,  marshal  of  the  St.  Louis  Court  of 
Appeals,  who  was  watching  by  the  sick-bed,  could  restrain 
his  curiosity  no  longer,  and  determined  to  clear  up  the 
great  mystery. 

So  he  said:  "John,  you  are  liable  to  die  before  morning, 
and  blanked  if  I  don't  want  to  know  what  made  you 
desire  to  be  buried  in  that  Swedish  cemetery." 

"Because,"  replied  the  jocund  ex-Missourian,  with  a 
feeble  smile — "because  that  is  the  last  place  on  earth 
the  devil  would  go  to  look  for  a  Democrat." 

Congress  is,  perhaps,  the  last  congregation  of  men 
which  a  person  would  visit  expecting  to  discover  a  poet. 
It  is  generally  taken  and  accepted  that  the  poetic  faculty 
needs  quietude,  rural  scenes,  and  an  esthetic  atmosphere 
to  induce  its  sustenance,  notwithstanding  the  fact  that 
General  Lytle  wrote  that  splendid  spirit-stirring  lyric, 
"I  am  dying,  Egypt,  dying,"  in  his  tent  amid  the  clangor 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  395 

of  arms,  the  night  before  the  battle  of  Chickamauga, 
where  he  died  a  hero's  death,  and  where  a  magnificent 
monument  marks  his  last  resting-place  on  the  field  of  his 
glory. 

In  Britain,  where  poets  are  more  plentiful  than  here, 
they  frequently  hold  official  stations.  Milton  was  Sec- 
retary of  State  for  Oliver  Cromwell.  Sir  Walter  Scott 
was  high  sheriff,  Robert  Burns  an  excise  officer,  and 
Macaulay,  before  he  was  elevated  to  the  peerage,  repre- 
sented the  city  of  Glasgow  for  many  years  in  the  House 
of  Commons,  and  was  more  than  once  a  member  of  the 
Cabinet.  Bulwer,  Lord  Lytton,  was  a  painstaking  and 
ambitious,  if  not  a  great  statesman;  and  his  son,  "Owen 
Meredith,'*  author  of  "Lucille,''  the  most  famous  poem  of 
his  generation,  has  been  governor-general  of  India.  In 
France  a  poet  is  as  liable  to  be  found  in  the  National 
Assembly  as  anywhere  else. 

Versifiers  or  rhymesters  are  not  rare  birds  in  Congress, 
for  anybody  with  a  reasonable  command  of  the  English 
language  can  write  in  perfect  meter  and  rhyme.  That's 
a  comparatively  easy  performance — purely  mechanical. 
John  Quincy  Adams  was  a  great  hand  at  that  sort  of 
composition,  and  he  had  about  as  much  real  poetry  in 
his  soul  as  a  marble  statue. 

Some  years  ago  the  delegate  in  Congress  from  Wyoming 
inflicted  on  the  House  a  two  hours'  speech  in  blank  verse, 
and  it  appeared  in  The  Record  next  morning  with  the 
legend  "copyrighted,  all  rights  reserved" — which  pro- 
duced a  tremendous  uproar  and  precipitated  a  fight  to 
expunge  it — not  that  anybody  wanted  to  infringe  his 
copyright  or  circulate  that  wonderful  document,  but 
because  the  members  thought  such  action  was  in  deroga- 
tion of  the  dignity  of  the  House. 

General  Garfield,  who  among  presidential  scholars 
ranks  with  Thomas  Jefferson  and  the  younger  Adams, 
was  a  felicitous  writer  of  verses,  some  of  which  might 


396   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

perhaps,  without  great  exaggeration,  be  ranked  as 
poetry. 

In  the  Fifty-third  Congress,  however,  a  genuine  poet 
of  no  mean  attainments  in  the  art  of  which  Byron  was 
the  most  proficient  master  sat  side  by  side  with  that  grim 
old  soldier,  Gen.  Daniel  E.  Sickles,  and  the  multimillion- 
aire, Joseph  C.  Sibley,  of  Pennsylvania. 

That  was  Dr.  Thomas  Dunn  EngHsh,  of  New  Jersey, 
whose  great  age,  as  well  as  standing  in  the  world  of  letters, 
is  shown  by  the  fact  that  he  was  bo(:h  a  contemporary 
and  rival  of  that  most  brilliant,  weird,  and  erratic  of  all 
American  poets,  Edgar  Allan  Poe. 

Doctor  English  had  one  failing  in  common  with  most 
literati — incapacity  to  judge  of  the  relative  merits  of  his 
own  productions. 

Milton  lived  and  died  in  the  erroneous  belief  that 
"Paradise  Regained"  was  superior  to  "Paradise  Lost,"  the 
truth  being  that  few  read  the  former  under  any  condi- 
tions whatever,  and  none  would  read  it  save  for  the  fact 
that  they  are  dazed  by  the  resplendent  glories  of  the 
latter. 

When  Southey  finished  one  of  his  boresome  epics  he 
would  exclaim:  "That  will  establish  my  fame  forever — 
that  will  outlast  *Paradise  Lost.'  "  He  always  despised  his 
minor  pieces.  Yet  nobody  ever  read  his  epics.  Even 
their  very  titles  are  forgotten,  while  those  of  lesser  poems 
are  still  remembered. 

Incomparably  the  greatest  poem  written  by  Thomas 
Campbell — indeed  one  of  the  greatest  ever  written  by 
anybody — is  "The  Pleasures  of  Hope."  There  are  pas- 
sages in  it  which  will  be  read  with  delight  as  long  as  the 
English  language  is  studied.  Nevertheless,  Campbell 
always  persisted  in  considering  it  as  one  of  his  crudest 
works. 

He  fretfully  said,  "I  was  first  introduced  into  society 
as  *the  author  of  "The  Pleasures  of  Hope,"'  I  was  mar- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  397 

ried  as  'the  author  of  "The  Pleasures  of  Hope,'"  and  no 
matter  what  I  do  or  say  I  can't  escape  from  the  hateful 
title  of  *the  author  of  "The  Pleasures  of  Hope.'"" 

His  biographer  adds,  rather  sardonically:  "I  could  not 
help  smiling  when  I  visited  the  cemetery  where  the  great 
poet  sleeps  and  saw  chiseled  upon  his  tombstone,  'Thomas 
Campbell,  author  of  "The  Pleasures  of  Hope.'"" 

So  with  Doctor  English.  Though  quite  a  prolific 
author,  his  fame  rests  solely  on  one  popular  song — "Ben 
Bolt" — ^which  has  been  sung  by  two  generations  of  lovers, 
which  has  been  used  as  one  of  the  leading  features  of 
"Trilby,"  which  Doctor  EngHsh  hated  most  heartily, 
and  the  mere  mention  of  which  affected  him  very  much 
as  the  shaking  of  a  red  rag  does  an  infuriated  bovine. 
Name  the  poem  to  him  and  he  would  flare  up  at  once 
and  yell:   "Damn  *Ben  Bolt'!"  in  most  unpoetic  fashion. 

Musical  experts  and  critics  of  poetry  have  been  search- 
ing long  for  a  song  which  will  be  as  thoroughly  a  national 
American  air  as  "Die  Wacht  am  Rhein"  is  German, 
the  "Marseillaise"  is  French,  or  "God  Save  the  King" 
is  English.  So  far,  according  to  their  own  statements, 
they  have  failed  utterly.  They  claim  that  there  are  ten- 
able objections  to  "Yankee  Doodle,"  "The  Star-spangled 
Banner,"  and  "My  Country,  'Tis  of  Thee." 

Mr.  Lincoln  declared  with  great  good  sense  and  good 
humor  that  the  Union  armies  captured  "Dixie"  along 
with  General  Lee,  and  it  is  gradually  becoming  popular 
in  all  sect  ons  of  the  country. 

Scores  of  poets  and  composers  of  music  have  tried  their 
hands  at  producing  for  us  a  national  hymn  or  anthem, 
both  easy  to  sing  and  to  play  on  any  musical  instrument, 
inspiring  in  sentiment,  pleasant  to  the  ear,  and  soul- 
stirring.  So  far  they  have  not  succeeded,  but  they  are 
still  trying.  During  my  four  terms  in  the  Speaker's  chair 
at  least  fifty  authors  have  sent  me  the  result  of  their 
l^bor?  un^er  the  impression  that  the  Speaker  of  the  House 


398   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

has  been  somehow  authorized  or  empowered  to  select  a 
national  hymn  or  anthem. 

The  critics  assert  that  "The  Star-spangled  Banner"  is 
simply  a  description  of  an  exceedingly  exciting  event  in 
our  history,  wholly  local  in  character.  Everybody  knows 
that.  The  critics,  however,  go  farther  and  assert  that 
the  words  are  commonplace  and  the  music  inadequate; 
and  as  to  singing  it,  that  is  well-nigh  impossible;  but 
surely  they  must  admit  that  when  rendered  by  a  brass 
band  it  is  magnificent.  The  vast  majority  of  people 
would  so  vote  were  a  plebiscite  held  on  that  subject. 

As  to  good  Doctor  Smith's  song,  "My  Country,  'Tis 
of  Thee,"  the  critics  say  that  he  localized  it  by  lugging  in 
the  Pilgrims,  and  that  while  the  Pilgrims  were  estimable 
folks,  no  doubt,  most  Americans  are  not  descended  from 
the  Pilgrims.  Moreover,  the  critics  object  to  the  music, 
asserting  that  the  air  is  that  of  "God  Save  the  King," 
which  we  borrowed  bodily  from  the  English,  who — mira- 
bile  dictu! — borrowed  it  from  the  Germans! 

Wonders  will  never  cease.  These  critics  proclaim  to 
all  the  world  that  fame  and  fortune  await  the  American 
who  will  write  a  truly  national  hymn  or  anthem  worthy 
of  America,  without  local  feature  or  borrowed  music. 

My  prediction,  however,  is  that  we  will  cling  to  "The 
Star-spangled  Banner"  and  "My  Country,  'Tis  of  Thee" 
for  some  time  yet. 

However  that  maybe.  Doctor  English  tried  his  hand  with 
this  result : 

HURRAH  FOR  YOU,  OLD  GLORY 

Though  changes  may  the  world  appal, 

Though  crowns  may  break  and  thrones  may  fall, 

Our  banner  shall  survive  them  all 

And  ever  live  in  story. 
The  rainbow  of  a  rescued  land, 
Where  freemen  brave  together  stand. 
With  truth  and  courage  hand  in  hand. 

Floats  proudly  here  Old  Glory. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  399 

Refrain: 

Old  Glory,  Old  Glory, 

Floats  proudly  here  Old  Glory, 
Old  Glory,  Old  Glory, 

Hurrah  for  you,  Old  Glory. 

In  days  we  fought  with  George  the  Third, 
When  independence  was  the  word 
One  voice  from  rising  manhood  heard 

As  well  as  old  age  hoary; 
One  purpose  then  we  had  in  view — 
To  form  of  states  a  union  true. 
And  eyes  and  hearts  were  turned  to  you. 

Our  banner  grand.  Old  Glory. 

With  you  we  scorn  both  lord  and  lown. 
We  heeded  not  old  England's  frown. 
We  fought  the  bulldogs  of  the  crown 

And  smote  the  skulking  Tory. 
Long  may  your  folds  above  us  wave. 
Cheered  by  the  honest  and  the  brave. 
And  gently  may  the  breezes  lave 

Your  rippling  sheet.  Old  Glory. 

Symbol  are  you  of  right  and  law, 
Whether  in  peace  the  bad  to  awe. 
Or  leading  on  where  freemen  draw 

Their  swords  in  battle  glory: 
Each  day  to  us  the  more  endears 
The  flag  that  now  for  many  years 
Has  filled  our  hopes  and  banned  our  fears, 

Your  stars  and  stripes.  Old  Glory. 

A  cloudy  sky  for  you  has  been 
When  brothers  met  in  battle  din. 
And  strove  supremacy  to  win; 

But  that's  an  olden  story; 
For  time  goes  on,  and  here  to-day. 
If  foreign  foes  invite  the  fray. 
We  boys  in  blue  and  boys  in  gray 

Will  rally  round  Old  Glory. 

Refrain: — Old  Glory,  etc. 


CHAPTER  XV 

Fifty-fifth  Congress — Spanish  War — Dingley  bill — Ohio  feuds  in  general — the 
Sherman-McKinley-Hanna  feud  in  particular — Sherman  and  Alger. 

THE  Fifty-fifth  Congress  is  noted  for  a  few  important 
events,  two  of  which  were  the  Spanish-American 
War  and  the  passage  of  the  Dingley  Tariff  bill.  Had  not 
the  Supreme  Court — by  a  five-to-four  decision  which  still 
stinks  in  the  nostrils  of  mankind — knocked  out  the  in- 
come-tax feature  of  the  Wilson-Gorman  Tariff  bill,  it  would 
have  brought  in  abundant  revenue  to  run  the  government, 
and  as  a  consequence  Governor  Dingley  never  could  have 
secured  the  enactment  of  a  bill  carrying  the  high  rates  of 
the  Dingley  bill.  After  the  income  tax  was  ehminated, 
there  was  a  deficiency  in  the  revenues,  and  as  the  Repub- 
licans had  the  President,  also  both  branches  of  Congress, 
Governor  Dingley  had  comparatively  easy  sailing.  Times 
were  improving  before  his  bill  was  passed,  and,  truth  to 
tell,  went  on  improving  even  more  rapidly  after  his  bill 
became  a  law.     His  bill  was  given  all  the  credit. 

The  Spanish-American  War,  which  broke  out  after  the 
Dingley  bill  was  passed,  was  not  entirely  unexpected. 
The  Spanish  misrule  in  Cuba  had  become  both  a  nuisance 
and  a  scandal.  So  many  Americans  had  business  con- 
nections in  the  island;  so  many  Americans  were  in  the 
Cuban  army,  of  whom  Frederick  Funston  was  most  fa- 
mous; so  many  Americans  were  resident  in  Cuba;  it  was 
so  close  to  our  shores;  the  cruel  despotism  of  the  Middle 
Ages  practised  almost  in  sight  of  Key  West;  sympathy 
for  a  downtrodden  people  struggling  to  be  free — all  these 
things  created  intense  interest  throughout  our  country. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  401 

In  addition  to  all  that,  we  had  for  many  years  cast  covet- 
ous eyes  on  Cuba.  Its  possession  was  very  near  the  heart 
of  Thomas  Jefferson,  and  the  Ostend  Manifesto  is  one  of 
the  most  famous  documents  in  our  history — though  noth- 
ing came  of  it.  But  we  solemnly  pledged  ourselves  not 
to  annex  Cuba,  and  we  kept  that  pledge — a  remarkable 
altruistic  performance — and,  having  freed  Cuba,  we 
brought  our  army  back  into  our  own  country.  Notwith- 
standing all  the  foregoing  facts,  and  notwithstanding  the 
tear-compelling  tales  of  woe  which  came  to  our  ears  from 
"The  Gem  of  the  Antilles,"  I  do  not  believe  we  would 
have  declared  war  against  Spain  had  it  not  been  for  the 
foolish  and  insulting  letter  which  the  Spanish  Minister 
DePuy  de  Lome  wrote  about  President  McKinley,  which 
created  a  tremendous  uproar.  The  blowing  up  of  the 
Maine  in  the  harbor  of  Havana  was  the  straw  that  broke 
the  camel's  back.  The  letter  enraged  the  people,  without 
regard  to  poHtical  affihations,  for  when  a  President  is 
sworn  in  he  becomes  instanter  and  ipso  facto  the  President 
of  us  all,  a  Democrat  resenting  a  brutal  insult  to  a  Repub- 
lican President  as  hotly  as  a  Republican,  and  vice  versa. 
Of  course,  we  all  reserve  the  sovereign  right  to  criticize 
and  lambast  our  own  President,  but  resent  outsiders  doing 
so.  President  McKinley,  himself  a  gallant  soldier,  was 
against  the  war,  and  hoped  to  settle  the  matter  by  diplo- 
macy; he  persisted  in  his  pacific  intentions  so  long  as  to 
alienate  many  Republicans;  but  when  the  offensive  letter 
of  the  Spanish  Minister  was  published  broadcast,  and  the 
Maine  was  blown  up,  killing  hundreds  of  our  sailors  sleep- 
ing peacefully  in  their  hammocks,  the  American  people 
cried  out  with  one  accord  for  vengeance  and  forced  the 
gentle  and  kind-hearted  President's  hand.  The  war  came, 
and  ended  in  one  hundred  days  in  the  complete  triumph 
of  American  arms — Admiral  Dewey  taking  rank  with  the 
great  sea  kings,  Colonel  Roosevelt  laying  the  foundation 
of  a  brilliant  public  career  and  world-wide  fame,  and  Gen, 

Vol.  I.— 26 


402   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Joe  Wheeler  going  into  battle  on  a  stretcher,  thereby 
emulating  the  far-resounding  exploit  of  Charles  the 
Twelfth  of  Sweden  at  Pultava.  Gen.  Nelson  A.  Miles, 
head  of  our  army,  the  foremost  American  soldier  then 
living,  was  not,  for  "prudential"  reasons,  assigned  to  a 
command  where  he  could  distinguish  himself.  Where- 
fore? A  man  does  not  have  to  be  a  Solomon  to  discover 
an  answer  to  that  question.  Millions  of  people  deemed 
the  treatment  he  received  as  a  great  outrage. 

Finally,  to  appease  the  friends  and  admirers  of  General 
Miles,  he  was  put  in  command  of  army  forces  to  invade 
Porto  Rico,  but  as  the  Porto-Ricans  welcomed  our  forces 
with  songs  and  strewed  flov/ers  in  their  pathway,  the 
general  had  no  opportunity  to  win  new  laurels.  His 
enemies  tried  to  belittle  the  battle-scarred  veteran  by  much 
scurrilous  talk,  touching  the  fact  that  in  going  to  war 
part  of  his  luggage  consisted  of  a  collapsible  bathtub — • 
as  if  a  soldier  does  not  need  a  bath  as  do  other  men — but 
all  their  flouts  and  jeers  did  not  convince  anybody  of 
sense  that  he  had  not  been  foully  dealt  with.  He  had 
fought  bravely  on  too  many  fields  of  slaughter;  he  had 
received  too  many  serious  wounds;  he  had  shed  too  much 
blood;  he  had  achieved  too  high  a  rank  for  a  person  with 
a  grain  of  wisdom  to  doubt  the  famous  warrior's  capacity 
or  courage.  Many  of  his  countrymen  still  believe  that 
he  was  maltreated  for  fear  that  new  laurels  won  on  the 
battle-field  would  make  him  a  formidable  candidate  for 
the  Presidency. 

As  a  sort  of  consolation  prize,  one  abiding  ambition  of 
General  Miles  was  realized — the  rank  of  lieutenant-general 
was  resurrected  for  him,  and  as  it  turned  out  necessarily 
for  others.  It  was  not  done,  however,  because  those  in 
authority  loved  him,  but  to  gratify  the  desire  of  Gen. 
Henry  C.  Corbin.  The  story  is  this:  For  years  General 
Miles,  who,  during  the  Civil  War,  fought  his  way  from  a 
dry-goods  clerkship  to  a  major-generalcy  in  command  of 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  403 

a  corps,  and  who  subsequently  was  one  of  the  most  suc- 
cessful Indian-fighters  in  our  history,  his  most  famous  feat 
being  the  capture  of  Geronimo,  had  been  striving  to  be 
made  lieutenant-general;  but  he  and  Gen.  Henry  C. 
Corbin  were  in  feud,  and  Corbin  being  the  more  wily 
politician  of  the  two,  thwarted  the  effort  of  General  Miles 
and  most  probably  would  have  continued  to  do  so  had  he 
not  suddenly  conceived  the  ambition  to  be  a  major- 
general — the  adjutant-general  having  been  up  to  that 
time  only  a  brigadier.  Presto,  change!  The  Miles  forces 
and  the  Corbin  forces  doubled  teams,  and  each  got  what 
he  wanted!  Some  of  us  tried  to  make  the  rank  of 
lieutenant-general  apply  only  to  Miles  by  name,  but  we 
could  not  accomplish  it,  so  that  we  had  a  string  of  lieu- 
tenant-generals of  whom  Corbin  was  one.  Finally,  one 
day  we  tacked  an  amendment  to  an  army  appropriation 
bill,  restricting  the  rank  of  lieutenant-general  to  veterans 
of  the  Civil  War.  After  that  we  did  not  have  any  more 
lieutenant-generals  until  the  World  War  began.  The  feud 
betwixt  Miles  and  Corbin  was  a  mild  and  ladylike  affair 
compared  with  that  between  Schley  and  Sampson,  both 
worthy  sea-fighters,  touchiag  the  honors  of  the  brilliant 
naval  victory  in  Cuban  waters,  which  attracted  much 
attention  and  created  intense  bitterness.  Both  of  them 
are  in  their  graves,  but  the  animosities  engendered  by 
their  controversy  still  survive  and  will  probably  survive 
as  long  as  the  history  of  the  American  navy  is  read. 

One  result  of  the  war  with  Spain  was  the  annexation  of 
the  Sandwich  Islands,  usually  called  the  Hawaiian  Islands, 
by  joint  resolution.  That  method  was  adopted  because 
it  was  well  known  that  the  necessary  two-thirds  majority 
to  ratify  a  treaty  of  annexation  could  not  be  mustered  in 
the  Senate.  In  fact,  the  joint  resolution  of  annexation 
passed  the  House  only  after  a  battle  royal  and  by  a 
narrow  margin.  It  would  not  have  passed  but  for  the 
fact  that  the  claim  was  set  up  that  it  was  a  "war  meas- 


404   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY. OF 

ure"  and  that  Hawaii  is  the  "key  to  the  Pacific,"  it  being 
vociferously  asserted  that  at  a  very  reasonable  cost 
*' Pearl  Harbor"  could  be  made  as  impregnable  as 
Gibraltar. 

It  will  be  remembered  that  in  the  last  days  of  the 
younger  Harrison's  administration  Sanford  B.  Dole  and 
other  Americans,  or  children  of  Americans  resident  in  the 
Kingdom  of  Hawaii,  engineered  a  revolution  which  over- 
threw the  monarchy  and  set  up  a  republic  of  which  Dole, 
one  of  the  handsomest  men  of  his  time,  was  President. 
Then  in  hot  haste  a  treaty  of  annexation  was  negotiated 
between  the  American  Republic  and  the  Hawaiian  Re- 
public; but  it  was  hung  up  in  the  Senate,  and  one  of  the 
first  things  President  Cleveland  did  after  he  was  inducted 
into  the  Presidency  the  second  time  was  to  withdraw 
that  treaty  from  the  consideration  of  the  Senate.  So  the 
annexation  scheme  was  in  suspense  during  his  term  and 
during  President  McKinley's  term  until  the  war  with 
Spain  began,  when  Francis  G.  Newlands,  of  Nevada,  then 
a  member  of  the  House  Committee  on  Foreign  Affairs, 
subsequently  a  Senator  in  Congress,  introduced  the  joint 
resolution  of  annexation.  That  was  the  most  important 
action  of  his  long  public  career,  and  if  the  Hawaiians  have 
any  sense  of  gratitude  they  will  erect  a  splendid  monu- 
ment to  perpetuate  his  memory,  for  undoubtedly  annexa- 
tion was  a  most  profitable  performance  for  Hawaii,  the 
sugar-planters  being  enabled  thereby  to  introduce  their 
products  into  the  immense  American  market  free  of  cus- 
tom duties  for  all  time  to  come,  which  was  really  the  milk 
in  the  cocoanut.  It  is  said  that  there  are  more  million- 
aires in  Hawaii  than  on  any  other  plot  of  rural  land  of  the 
same  size  on  the  habitable  globe,  and  nearly  every  one  of 
them  is  a  "Sugar  King" — the  sugar  which  gives  them  the 
title  of  kings  being  produced  by  cheap  Japanese,  Chinese, 
and  Portuguese  labor.  No  wonder  that  the  sugar-raisers 
of  H^w^ii  w^r^  red-hot;  for  ^nn^j^ationt    "There  wer^ 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  405 

millions  in  it,"  more  millions  than  Colonel  Sellers  dreamed 
of  as  a  result  of  his  eye-water. 

Another  important  result  of  the  Spanish-American,  War 
was  that  we  not  only  came  into  possession  of  Porto  Rico, 
but  also  of  Guam  and  the  Philippine  Archipelago,  which 
made  us  an  "Asiatic  Power."  One  consequence  of  pos- 
sessing our  "Oriental  empire"  is  that  we  truthfully  boast 
that  the  sun  never  sets  on  our  dominions,  which  is  an 
asset  of  doubtful  value.  Incidentally  it  is  apropos  to 
state  that  the  Philippine  Islands  are  the  only  piece  of 
land  that  England  ever  voluntarily  relinquished.  They 
had  them  three  hundred  years  ago  and  sailed  away  and 
left  them.  Our  "Oriental  empire,"  about  which  we 
speak  so  grandiloquently,  contains  less  cultivable  land 
than  does  the  one-third  part  of  Missouri  north  of  the  Big 
Muddy. 

As  was  natural,  some  scandals  grew  out  of  the  Spanish- 
American  War.  All  history  shows  that  in  the  rush  of 
things  in  war  more  or  less  of  scandal  is  inherent  and 
inevitable.  It  is  an  old  saying  that  the  poor  we  have 
with  us  always.  It  might  well  be  added  that  we  have 
profiteers  and  thieves  with  us  always.  Human  nature 
has  not  changed  one  jot  or  tittle  since  Adam  and  Eve 
were  driven  from  Eden  with  flaming  swords,  and  it  will 
not  change  till  the  earth  perishes  from  fervent  heat.  It 
was  freely  charged  that  certain  rascals  in  1898  made 
princely  fortunes  by  taking  advantage  of  the  necessities 
of  the  government  in  the  name  of  patriotism  and  unload- 
ing on  Uncle  Sam  unseaworthy  ships  and  old  tubs  at 
fabulous  prices — vessels  which  endangered  the  lives  of 
soldiers  herded  onto  them.  It  was  also  alleged  that 
there  was  much  swindling  in  the  purchase  of  horses,  mules, 
and  every  species  of  supplies  needed  by  the  army.  The 
most  notorious  scandal — one  that  smelled  to  heaven — 
was  touching  embalmed  beef,  which  outraged  the  feelings 
of  every  right-thinkmg  man,  woman,  and  child  in  the 


4o6   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Republic.  Col.  Theodore  Roosevelt's  celebrated  round- 
robin  set  the  country  wild,  and  the  administration  was 
afraid  to  court-martial  him.  All  these  scandals,  with 
others  nameless  here,  forevermore  drove  the  Secretary  of 
War,  Gen.  Russell  A.  Alger,  out  of  the  Cabinet.  Nobody 
thought  for  one  moment  that  Alger  was  dishonest.  He 
was  simply  the  victim  of  the  bad  conduct  of  some  of  his 
subordinates.  His  sin  was  in  being  over-confiding  in  cer- 
tain of  his  friends.  He  was  a  very  rich  and  a  very  chari- 
table man,  with  a  creditable  war  record,  having  fought  his 
way  to  the  double  stars  of  a  major-general.  He  had  been 
a  prominent  candidate  for  the  Republican  presidential 
nomination,  but  there  had  to  be  a  scapegoat,  and  he  was 
it.  The  people  of  Michigan  speedily  vindicated  him  by 
an  election  to  the  Senate  of  the  United  States. 

John  Sherman,  who  had  for  years  aspired  to  the  Presi- 
dency without  success,  and  who  led  on  every  ballot  but 
the  last  for  the  Republican  nomination  in  the  convention 
of  1888,  when  Gen.  Benjamin  Harrison  was  nominated, 
was  McKinley's  first  Secretary  of  State,  and  General 
Alger,  who  was  also  a  candidate  for  the  Republican  presi- 
dential nomination  in  1888,  was  his  first  Secretary  of 
War — ^which  must  be  considered  remarkable  when  it  is 
remembered  that  in  his  book  Sherman  uses  this  language 
touching  his  colleague:  "I  believe,  and  had,  as  I  thought, 
conclusive  proof  that  the  friends  of  General  Alger  sub- 
stantially purchased  the  votes  of  many  of  the  delegates 
from  the  Southern  states  who  had  been  instructed  by 
their  conventions  to  vote  for  me."  (Page  1029,  Vol.  2.) 
Again,  on  page  1032,  Sherman  says,  in  speaking  of  Gen. 
Benjamin  Harrison's  nomination  and  his  own  defeat: 
"The  only  feeHng  of  resentment  I  entertained  was  in 
regard  to  the  action  of  the  friends  of  General  Alger  in 
tempting  with  money  poor  negroes  to  violate  the  instruc- 
tions of  their  constituents";  but,  nevertheless  and  not- 
withstanding,  Sherman   was   McKinley's   premier,   and 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  407 

Alger  his  war  chief.  Sherman  published  his  book,  en- 
titled John  Sherman  s  Recollections  of  Forty  Years  in 
House,  Senate,  and  Cabinet,  in  1895,  but,  notwithstanding 
his  severe  strictures  on  General  Alger,  on  March  5,  1897, 
they  sat  side  by  side  in  President  McKinley's  Cabinet. 
Each  could  have  repeated  the  lines  from  "A  Midsummer 
Night's  Dream": 

So  we  grew  together, 

Like  a  double  cherry,  seeming  parted, 

But  yet  a  union  in  partition; 

Two  lovely  berries  on  one  stem. 

Verily,  verily,  politics  makes  strange  bedfellows. 

There  is  an  old  proverb  to  the  effect  that  the  pot  should 
not  call  the  kettle  black.  Whether  Sherman's  charge  that 
General  Alger's  friends  purchased  his  Southern  delegates 
is  true  or  not,  it  appears  that  Sherman's  friends,  notably 
Marcus  Alonzo  Hanna,  quartermaster  of  the  Sherman 
Ohio  delegation,  as  he  termed  himself — actually  manager 
of  the  delegation — ^were  pursuing  the  same  tactics  to  capt- 
ure Southern  delegates  for  Sherman. 

Senator  Joseph  Benson  Foraker,  who  placed  Sherman 
in  nomination  in  that  convention,  and  who  would  prob- 
ably have  been  nominated  himself  if  he  had  consented, 
which  he  refused  to  do,  says  in  his  book:  **Each  delegate 
to  the  convention  was  entitled  to  two  extra  tickets  of 
admission  for  each  session.  The  purpose  of  these  extra 
tickets  was  to  enable  those  furnished  with  them  to  ac- 
commodate friends,  but  the  delegates  from  the  Southern 
states  were  far  from  home  and  short  of  cash.  They  had 
few  friend:;  to  accommodate,  but  many  necessities  that 
were  urgent.  Even  before  the  first  session  of  the  con- 
vention was  held  rumors  were  afloat  that  the  Southern 
delegates  were  seUing  their  extra  tickets  and  that  they 
were  being  purchased  in  the  respective  interests  of  dif- 
ferent candidates.  The  names  of  General  Alger  and  Mr. 
Sherman  were  both  mentioned  in  this  connection. 


4o8   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

"I  had  no  personal  knowledge  of  anything  of  the  kind 
being  done  by  anybody,  until  a  day  or  two  before  the 
balloting  comnienced,  when  I  had  occasion  to  go  to 
Mr.  Hanna's  room  to  see  him  about  something,  and  found 
him  there  engaged  in  buying  and  paying  for  such  tickets. 
There  were  a  number  of  negro  delegates  in  his  room,  and 
he  was  taking  their  tickets  and  paying  them  therefor  in 
the  most  open,  business-like  way. 

"I  was  greatly  surprised  by  what  I  saw,  and  ventured 
to  express  displeasure  therewith.  He  defended  his  action 
as  necessary  because  the  same  tactics  were  being  resorted 
to  by  others.  I  quickly  left  his  room,  and  never  returned 
to  it.  I  also  succeeded  in  exchanging  my  room,  then 
near  his,  for  another  on  a  different  floor,  which  I  occupied 
until  the  close  of  the  convention. 

"Mr.  Sherman,  in  his  Personal  Recollections y  states  that 
he  was  informed  and  made  to  believe  that  the  friends  of 
General  Alger  were  bribing  delegates  from  the  Southern 
states,  who  had  been  instructed  to  vote  for  him  and  to 
desert  him  and  vote  for  Alger,  by  buying  their  tickets. 
What  was  done  in  that  respect  I  do  not  know,  but  a  glance 
at  the  vote  cast  by  the  Southern  delegates  will  show  that 
Mr.  Hanna  did  not  allow  very  many  of  them  to  get  away 
from  him.  For  instance,  out  of  twenty  votes  from  Ala- 
bama, Alger  got  six,  Sherman  twelve;  Georgia,  Alger 
none,  Sherman  nineteen;  Louisiana,  Alger  two,  Sherman 
nine;  Mississippi,  Alger  none,  Sherman  twelve;  North 
Carolina,  Alger  two,  Sherman  fifteen;  South  CaroHna, 
Alger  three,  Sherman  eleven;  Tennessee,  Alger  nine, 
Sherman  seven;  Virginia,  Alger  three,  Sherman  eleven, 
and  so  on  to  the  end. 

"I  came  to  know  General  Alger  in  later  years  much 
better  than  I  knew  him  at  that  time.  I  knew  enough  of 
the  two  men,  Sherman  and  Alger,  to  know  that  neither 
one  would  have  countenanced  or  permitted  the  doing  of 
anj^  such  thing  in  his  behalf  if  he  h^d  been  informed  about 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  409 

it,  and  I  am  sure  that  neither  one  ever  beheved  that  any- 
thing of  the  kind  had  been  done  in  his  behalf.  Mr. 
Sherman  says  so  in  so  many  words  in  his  Personal  Recol- 
lections, and  General  Alger  said  so  in  the  most  emphatic 
manner  as  often  as  he  had  occasion  to  speak  on  the 
subject. 

"There  was  much  discussion  among  the  delegates  as  to 
what  was  going  on  with  respect  to  the  Southern  vote, 
but  I  did  not  hear  of  anybody  denying  that  Mr.  Hanna 
was  purchasing  tickets  from  the  negro  delegates;  cer- 
tainly there  was  no  denial  by  Mr.  Hanna.  An  entirely 
different  defense  was  made.  It  was  that  he  was  only 
trying  to  hold  delegates  who  had  been  instructed  by  their 
constituents  to  support  Mr.  Sherman.  On  the  other 
hand,  it  was  asserted  that  nobody  was  bound  to  respect 
the  instructions,  for  the  reason  that  they  had  been  pur- 
chased in  the  first  place,  as  the  tickets  were  then  being 
purchased.  The  whole  subject  is  unsavory  and  dis- 
agreeable, and  I  mention  it  at  all  only  because  of  what 
Mr.  Sherman  said,  and  because  of  what  Mr.  Croly  has 
said  in  his  Life  of  Mr.  Hanna,  and  to  the  end  that  justice 
may  be  done  to  all  concerned,  including  Mr.  Hanna,  who 
was  so  constituted  that  he  was  unable  to  see  anything  in 
the  transaction  except  only  that  he  was  holding  on  to 
what  belonged  to  him  and  that  there  was  nothing  to 
consider,  except  only  the  price  he  had  to  pay;  and  he 
was  not  the  man  to  allow  that  to  stand  in  the  way. 

"Mr.  Croly,  after  referring  to  this  incident,  and  quoting 
from  a  statement  I  made  at  the  time  with  respect  to  it, 
adds  the  following: 

"'There  is  some  truth  in  the  foregoing  statement. 
Other  members  of  the  convention  state  that  Mr.  Hanna 
had  in  his  trunk  more  tickets  to  the  convention  than  he 
could  have  obtained  in  any  way  except  by  their  purchase 
from  negro  delegates.  Such  practices  were  common  at 
the  time,  but  they  were  indefensible,  and  if  they  evoked 


4IO   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF  ' 

a  protest  from  Mr.  ForaKer,  he  deserves  credit  for  the 
protest.' 

"Mr.  Croly  seems  to  have  investigated  for  himself,  and 
to  have  found  confirmatory  proof  of  the  truth  of  my 
statement.  If  he  made  any  earnest  investigation,  he  is 
unjust  in  trying  to  minimize  by  saying  'there  is  some 
truth'  in  my  statement.  My  statement  was  the  exact 
truth — nothing  more,  nothing  less — and  almost  any  mem- 
ber of  the  delegation  would  tell  him  so." 

The  real  tragedy  of  McKinley's  administration  grew 
out  of  the  appointment  of  John  Sherman  as  Secretary  of 
State,  and  his  resignation  of  that  high  place — which  added 
one  more  to  the  many  Republican  vendettas  in  Ohio. 
As  nearly  as  can  be  ascertained  from  the  mazes  of  con- 
tradiction and  the  mass  of  malice,  the  situation  was  this: 
President  McKinley  and  Marcus  Alonzo  Hanna  were 
bosom  cronies  and  had  been  for  years.  McKinley  was 
under  deepest  obligations  to  Hanna,  both  financially  and 
politically — financially  because  when  McKinley  found 
himself  in  debt  in  the  large  sum  of  sixty-five  thousand 
dollars  by  reason  of  having  to  pay  the  debts  of  friends 
for  whom  he  had  gone  security,  Hanna  raised  a  "pony 
purse"  and  paid  him  out;  politically  for  reasons  which 
all  the  world  knows.  It  was  altogether  natural  and  to 
his  credit  that  when  he  came  to  be  President  he  desired 
to  do  something  for  his  powerful  and  faithful  friend,  whom 
he  and  everybody  else  rated  as  a  presidential  Warwick. 
He  could  by  his  mere  ipse  dixit  have  given  him  a  Cabinet 
position,  and  as  a  matter  of  fact  pressed  him  to  accept  a 
Cabinet  portfolio,  especially  that  of  Postmaster-General. 
Everybody  took  it  for  granted  that  Hanna  would  be  in 
the  Cabinet,  as  his  antecedents  indicated  that  that  was 
the  official  position  for  which  he  was  best  fitted.  To  the 
surprise  of  McKinley  and  everybody  else,  he  firmly  and 
repeatedly  declined  a  Cabinet  place,  but  let  it  be  known 
that  he  wanted  to  go  to  the  Senate  of  the  United  States. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  411 

His  biographer,  Herbert  Croly,  says  that  he  had  secretly 
nursed  that  ambition  for  several  years.  As  Senator 
Foraker,  who  never  failed  to  sneer  at  Croly  and  to  cast 
insinuations  on  Croly's  veracity  and  bona  fides,  corrobo- 
rates Croly  on  that  one  point,  it  must  be  accepted  as  true. 
No  doubt  if  McKinley  could  have  appointed  a  United 
States  Senator  he  would  have  appointed  Hanna;  but  he 
could  not  appoint  a  Senator,  and,  what  was  more  and  still 
worse,  there  was  no  senatorial  vacancy  from  Ohio.  Con- 
sequently, while  McKinley  was  amazed  at  Hanna's  am- 
bition for  a  senatorial  toga  in  preference  to  a  Cabinet 
portfoho,  the  two  laid  their  heads  together  to  secure  the 
creation  of  an  Ohio  senatorial  vacancy.  It  was  abso- 
lutely preposterous  to  suggest  to  Gov.  Joseph  Benson 
Foraker  that  he  decline  or  resign  the  senatorial  term — 
his  first  term — to  begin  March  4,  1897.  He  had  been 
fighting  a  long  time  to  reach  the  Senate,  having  given 
John  Sherman  the  senatorial  fight  of  his  fife  in  1892. 
Foraker,  whatever  his  faults,  was  the  most  brilliant  of 
the  whole  batch  of  Buckeye  statesmen  of  that  era.  He 
hated  Hanna  most  savagely  for  several  reasons,  princi- 
pally because  Hanna  had  bolted  his  nomination  for  a 
third  gubernatorial  term  in  1889  and  had  managed  Sher- 
man's fight  for  re-election  to  the  Senate  in  1892.  He  also 
was  jealous  of  McKinley,  believing  firmly  that  he  should 
have  been  elected  President  instead  of  McKinley.  So  it 
would  have  been  sheer  madness  to  have  suggested  to  the 
fiery,  proud,  eloquent,  brilliant,  sensitive,  and  ambitious 
Foraker  to  make  way  for  Hanna,  his  arch-enemy.  But  as 
a  senatorial  vacancy  must  be  created  to  satisfy  Hanna*s 
ambition,  and  as  Foraker  was  utterly  hopeless,  it  was 
made  by  inducing  John  Sherman  to  resign  irom  the  Senate 
and  to  accept  the  Secretaryship  of  State.  Hanna  was  first 
appointed  his  successor  after  much  pressure  was  brought 
to  bear  on  Governor  Bushnell,  whose  nomination  for  Gov- 
ernor Hanna  had  bitterly  fought.     There  was  a  red-hot 


412   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

row,  much  intrigue,  much  manipulation,  but  Hanna  was 
appointed,  while  Foraker,  who  had  made  Bushnell  Gov- 
ernor, like  Saul  of  Tarsus  at  the  stoning  of  Stephen,  stood 
by  consenting,  very  much  to  his  subsequent  regret.  In 
January,  1898,  Hanna  was  elected  for  both  the  short  and 
long  terms,  after  one  of  the  bitterest  and  most  scandalous 
fights  in  American  history.  All  sorts  of  charges  of  brib- 
ing and  corruption,  kidnapping  and  general  deviltry  on 
both  sides  filled  the  air.  Hanna's  enemies  filed  charges 
in  the  Senate,  where  he  was  acquitted,  or,  as  his  opponents 
expressed  it,  ** whitewashed."  Men  wondered  why  he 
preferred  a  senatorship  to  a  Cabinet  position,  and  they 
wondered  still  more  why  Sherman,  who  had  been  a  Rep- 
resentative in  Congress  for  six  years,  a  Senator  for  thirty- 
two  years.  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  for  four  years,  and 
had  been  elected  to  the  Senate  for  six  years  more,  of  which 
term  two  years  remained,  was  willing  to  relinquish  his 
seat  therein,  with  whose  duties  he  was  thoroughly  famil- 
iar, to  assume  the  duties  of  a  position  of  uncertain  tenure, 
and  with  whose  duties  he  was  unfamiliar,  since  he  had 
devoted  the  whole  of  his  long  and  laborious  life  to  eco- 
nomic questions.  Men  still  wonder  why  he  consented 
to  the  change.  What  the  inducements  were  and  what 
pressure,  if  any,  was  applied  to  him  will  probably  never 
be  divulged.  I  do  not  know,  and  I  have  never  seen  any- 
body who  would  give  the  inside  history  of  that  mystifying 
transaction.  It  is  dijfficult  to  conceive  that  he  believed 
that  being  Secretary  of  State  would  add  one  cubit  to  his 
stature  as  a  statesman,  and  it  is  equally  difficult  to  con- 
ceive that  pressure  could  have  been  brought  to  bear  on 
him,  as  he  was  at  the  age  of  seventy-four  in  possession  of 
a  curule  chair  with  every  reason  to  believe  that  he  held 
his  place  in  the  Senate  by  life  tenure. 

Having  accepted  the  premiership  of  the  administration 
in  March,  1897,  to  the  surprise  of  the  political  world  in 
the  spring  of  1898,  he  utterly  amazed  it  by  suddenly  re- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  413 

signing.  His  unexpected  action  set  all  political  tongues 
and  heads  to  wagging.  All  sorts  of  guesses  were  made; 
all  sorts  of  reasons  were  assigned;  all  sorts  of  predictions 
were  indulged  in;  all  sorts  of  whispers  and  innuendoes 
were  heard  as  to  a  new  Republican  feud  in  Ohio,  and  all 
the  Ohio  feuds,  both  Republican  and  Democratic,  and 
they  are  almost  numberless — were  dug  up  and  burnished 
into  new  life.  Finally  the  politicians  ranged  themselves 
into  two  groups,  one  claiming  that  the  venerable  Sherman 
had  been  foully  dealt  with,  asseverating  that  after  being 
lured  from  the  Senate  by  the  bait  of  the  Secretaryship  of 
State  in  order  to  make  room  for  Hanna,  and  having  been 
used  for  the  purposes  of  the  McKinley-Hanna  combine, 
he  had  been  forced  to  resign  from  the  Cabinet.  What 
the  Shermanites  said  about  McKinley  and  Hanna  was 
simply  awful.  The  McKinleyites  and  Hannaites  retorted 
that  they  had  only  performed  a  necessary  public  and 
patriotic  service  in  ridding  the  Cabinet  of  Sherman's 
presence,  that  he  was  in  his  dotage,  had  incipient  paresis, 
and  that  his  senile  babblings  during  a  time  of  war  were 
not  only  aggravating  and  humiliating,  but  most  decidedly 
dangerous  to  the  country.  The  Shermanites  countered 
by  swearing  the  charges  aforesaid  to  be  a  pack  of  malicious 
and  preposterous  lies  hatched  for  the  purpose  of  justifying 
their  cruelty  to  Sherman.  The  battle  raged  with  great 
volubility  and  intense  acrimony.  Even  the  stirring  events 
of  the  Spanish  War  did  not  induce  people  to  cease  from 
wrangling  and  jangling  about  Sherman's  resignation.  He 
died  in  a  little  over  two  years  after  retiring  to  private  life, 
a  sorely  disappointed  man.  No  doubt  the  dispute  as  to 
his  political  taking-ofF  still  goes  on  in  the  outlying  pre- 
cincts of  Ohio,  and  will  never  end  so  long  as  the  names 
of  McKinley,  Hanna,  and  Sherman  are  remembered 
among  the  Buckeyes,  for  they  dearly  love  a  feud. 

In  his  Life  of  Hanna  Croly  seems  to  prove  that  not 
only  was  Sherman  gla4  to  be  Secretary  of  State,  but  he 


414   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

was  anxious  that  Hanna  should  succeed  him  in  the  Sen- 
ate— so  anxious,  in  fact,  that  he  would  not  agree  to  resign 
his  senatorship  until  Governor  Bushnell  had,  after  much 
pressure  and  very  reluctantly,  agreed  to  appoint  Hanna 
— ^which  the  Governor  did  and  which  he  bitterly  regretted 
to  his  dying  day. 

Croly  also  states,  and  seems  to  prove  it,  that  sundry 
persons  endeavored  to  dissuade  McKinley  from  appoint- 
ing Sherman,  because  of  his  failing  condition  mentally 
and  physically — especially  as  to  his  memory;  but,  accord- 
ing to  Croly,  McKinley — urged  thereto  by  Hanna — replied 
that  few  people  knew  of  Sherman's  faihng  strength;  that 
he  was  universally  regarded  as  an  eminent  statesman; 
that  his  appointment  as  Secretary  of  State  would  give 
immense  prestige  to  his  administration;  and  that  by  giv- 
ing him  a  vigorous,  clear-headed  Assistant  Secretary  of 
State  to  do  the  real  work  he  would  have  the  benefit  of 
Sherman's  famous  name  and  sage  advice,  and  things 
would  work  out  all  right.  Consequently  Sherman  was 
appointed,  and  Judge  William  R.  Day,  of  Ohio,  his  chief 
assistant.  When  Sherman  resigned.  Day  became  Secre- 
tary of  State,  headed  the  American  Peace  Commission  to 
Paris,  was  subsequently  United  States  Circuit  Judge,  and 
is  now  a  member  of  the  Federal  Supreme  Court. 

Whatever  may  be  the  exact  truth,  one  thing  is  as  clear 
as  crystal,  and  that  is  that  Sherman  himself  thought  he 
had  been  badly  manhandled,  and  retired  from  the  Cabi- 
net in  high  dudgeon,  hating  both  McKinley  and  Hanna 
till  death  took  him. 

Hon.  Theodore  E.  Burton,  a  fine,  scholarly  man  of 
Ohio,  now  of  New  York,  who  was  both  a  Representative 
and  a  Senator  in  Congress,  says,  in  his  Life  of  John  Sher- 
man: "It  cannot  be  denied,  however,  that  he  left  the 
Cabinet  with  a  degree  of  bitterness  toward  President 
McKinley,  more  by  reason  of  his  practical  supersession 
than  for  any  other  reason,  but  also  with  the  belief  that 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  415 

he  had  been  transferred  to  the  Cabinet  to  make  room  for 
another  in  the  Senate."  Burton  appears  to  be  an  un- 
prejudiced witness. 

Senator  Foraker,  who  hated  both  McKinley  and  Hanna 
savagely,  and  who  was  not  intensely  enamoured  of  Sher- 
man, in  his  Notes  on  a  Busy  Life^  in  speaking  of  Sherman 
as  Secretary  of  State,  says: 

"As  the  weeks  and  months  went  by  Mr.  Sherman 
noticed  that  he  was  not  conferred  with  and  deferred  to 
with  respect  to  the  important  matters  he  had  in  charge 
to  the  full  extent  he  thought  he  should  be.  He  felt 
offended.  Just  what  may  have  been  said  by  him  to  the 
President  or  by  the  President  to  him  I  do  not  know,  but 
I  do  know  that  no  one  in  Washington  official  Hfe  was 
surprised  when,  finally,  upon  the  declaration  of  war  with 
Spain,  Mr.  Sherman  tendered  his  resignation  and  the 
President  accepted  it. 

"Mr.  Sherman  continued  to  reside  in  Washington  most 
of  the  time  until  his  death  in  October,  1900.  During  all 
the  time  he  was  in  the  Cabinet,  and  thereafter  until  his 
death,  he  never  lost  an  opportunity  to  show  me  the 
warmest  friendship  and  the  strongest  good-will.  He  did 
not  come  very  often  to  the  Senate  Chamber,  but  he  visited 
there  a  number  of  times  during  this  period.  In  each 
instance,  when  I  did  not  happen  to  see  him  as  he  en- 
tered, he  at  once  sent  a  page  to  notify  me  he  was  there 
and  to  request  me  to  come  and  sit  with  him  on  a  sofa 
in  the  rear  of  the  Senators'  seats,  provided  for  the  ac- 
commodation of  those  entitled  to  the  privileges  of  the 
floor. 

"On  no  one  of  these  occasions  did  he  ever  speak  to  Mr. 
Hanna,  or  ever  speak  of  him,  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  except 
only  once,  when  he  asked  me  if  Senator  Hanna  was  then 
in  the  Chamber.  The  Senator  was  in  his  seat  and  I 
pointed  him  out  to  him,  but  he  did  not  ask  to  see  him  or 
speak  to  him  on  that  occasion,  or  engage  in  any  conver- 


4i6  MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

sation  whatever  in  regard  to  him.  He  came  several  times 
to  my  residence.  He  was  always  extremely  cordial  and 
talked  much  about  the  business  of  the  Senate,  its  agree- 
able character,  and  how  much  he  had  enjoyed  his  service 
there.  But  he  never,  at  any  time,  except  in  the  one 
instance  mentioned,  made  any  inquiry  about  Senator 
Hanna  or  mentioned  his  name  in  any  connection  what- 
ever; neither  did  he  ever,  on  any  occasion,  speak  of  the 
President  or  his  administration  or  any  of  the  policies  he 
was  pursuing.  He  always,  in  his  conversation  with  me, 
was  silent  with  respect  to  both,  and  what  they  were  doing, 
as  though  he  had  never  heard  of  either. 

"I  know,  however,  from  others  with  whom  he  did  talk, 
that  he  felt  deeply  offended  and  that,  when  he  took  occa- 
sion to  speak  on  the  subject,  he  usually  said  what  for  him 
were  very  bitter  things.  I  know  that  his  family  shared 
this  feeling  to  such  an  extent  that  when  I  attended  his 
funeral  at  Mansfield  I  was  told  by  one  of  the  relatives 
that  some  flowers  had  been  sent  from  the  White  House 
and  that  they  had  refused  to  receive  them. 

"Having  heard  all  this,  I  was  less  surprised  than  I 
would  otherwise  have  been  when,  on  the  first  day  of 
March,  1902,  while  en  route  from  Washington  to  New 
York,  I  met  on  the  train  Gen.  Nelson  A.  Miles,  whose 
wife  was  a  daughter  of  Judge  Charles  T.  Sherman,  the 
Senator's  brother,  and  was  told  by  him  that  he  had  been 
carrying  in  his  pocket  for  some  time  an  autograph  letter 
written  by  Mr.  Sherman  to  somebody,  he  did  not  know 
to  whom,  but  for  some  reason  not  mailed  to  the  party  for 
whom  it  was  intended,  but  carefully  filed  with  other 
papers  that  were  to  be  made  public  after  his  death;  that 
he  was  authorized  to  give  it  to  me  for  such  use  as  I  might 
see  fit  to  make  of  it.  He  then  produced  the  following 
letter,  which  on  my  return  to  Washington  I  placed  in  an 
envelop,  where  until  now  it  has  ever  since  remained,  on 
which  envelop  I  indorsed    *The  within  letter  deHvered 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  417 

to  me  by  General  Miles  on  train  en  route  to  New  York, 
March  i,  1902.' 

*' Washington,  D.  C,  8  November,  1898. 
**My  Dear  Sir, — Your  note  of  the  6th  inst.  is  received  and  I  give  you 
my  hearty  thanks.  No  doubt  I  ought  to  have  remained  in  the  Senate 
during  my  term,  which  would  not  have  expired  until  the  4th  of  March 
next.  At  that  time  I  regarded  McKinley  as  a  sincere  and  ardent 
friend  whom  I  had  assisted  and  whose  election  I  had  promoted.  When 
he  urged  me  to  accept  the  position  of  Secretary  of  State  I  accepted 
with  some  reluctance  and  largely  to  promote  the  wishes  of  Mark 
Hanna.  The  result  was  that  I  lost  the  position  both  of  Senator  and 
Secretary,  and  I  hear  that  both  McKinley  and  Hanna  are  pitying  me 
for  failing  memory  and  physical  strength.  I  do  not  care  for  their 
pity  and  do  not  ask  them  any  favors,  but  wish  only  to  feel  independent 
of  them,  and  conscious  that,  while  they  deprived  me  of  the  high  office 
of  Senator  by  the  temporary  appointment  as  Secretary  of  State,  they 
have  not  lessened  me  in  your  opinion  or  in  the  good-will  of  the  great 
Republican  party  of  the  United  States. 

"Very  truly  yours, 

John  Sherman.'* 

Finally  Croly  says:  "In  spite  of  Senator  Sherman's 
professions  of  gratitude,  he  never  mentions  Mr.  Hanna's 
name  in  the  lengthy  account  of  his  final  election  to  the 
Senate,  which  appears  in  his  Reminiscences.  Indeed,  Mr. 
Hanna's  name  never  appears  in  the  entire  book.  The 
volume  was  published  in  1895  and  1896,  so  that  Mr. 
Sherman's  later  grievance  against  Mr.  Hanna,  if  griev- 
ance it  was,  could  have  had  nothing  to  do  with  the 
omission." 

Mr.  Croly,  in  his  book,  reveals  an  astonishing  fact 
touching  the  relations  between  McKinley  and  Hanna 
which  few,  very  few,  people  ever  heard  of.  That  is  that 
more  than  once  there  was  a  slight  alienation  of  feeKngs 
betwixt  the  twain.  The  reason  he  assigns  is  more  amaz- 
ing than  the  fact,  and  that  is  that  McKinley  was  jealous 
of  Hanna's  increasing  fame  and  fearful  that  he  (McKin- 
ley) would  be  overshadowed  by  it! 

Vol.  I.— 27 


4i8   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Croly  states  two  things  about  them  repeatedly,  with 
much  positiveness — that  they  were  both  against  the 
Spanish  War  and  both  against  Roosevelt's  nomination 
as  Vice-President. 

I  have  gone  into  this  McKinley-Sherman-Hanna  mat- 
ter at  length  partly  because  it  is  one  of  the  most  mys- 
terious transactions  in  American  history  and  partly  be- 
cause, when  I  was  a  very  young  man,  I  attended  the 
Cincinnati  Law-school  and  got  the  hang  of  Ohio  politics. 
For  two  generations  there  has  been  more  politics  in  Ohio 
than  anywhere  else  on  earth,  and  I  have  somewhat  kept 
the  run  of  things  in  that  state.  Somebody  who,  accord- 
ing to  the  life  tables,  has  thirty  or  forty  years  to  live 
should  write  a  book  about  "Ohio  Political  Vendettas, 
both  Democratic  and  Republican."  In  interest  it  would 
double-discount  all  the  books  ever  written  about  the 
mountain  feuds  in  Kentucky,  Tennessee,  and  West  Vir- 
ginia. He  would  have  superabundant  materials  in  the 
relations  of  Allen  G.  Thurman  and  Vallandigham,  Allen 
G.  Thurman  and  his  illustrious  uncle,  "Rise  Up"  William 
Allen,  Pendleton  and  Payne,  Chase  and  Wade,  Sherman 
and  Garfield,  Sherman  and  Foraker,  Sherman  and  Mc- 
Kinley,  Sherman  and  Hanna,  Foraker  and  Hanna,  Foraker 
and  Taft,  Foraker  and  Sherman,  Payne  and  Brice,  John 
R.  McLean  and  Tom  Johnson,  Foraker  and  Harding, 
McLean  and  Hoadley,  and  others  ad  libitum. 

For  years  Ohio  has  been  in  the  "presidential  belt"  for 
several  reasons:  First,  because  of  its  central  location; 
second,  because,  while  it  has  been  reliably  Republican, 
the  bosses  permitted  it  to  go  Democratic  often  enough  in 
off  years  to  maintain  for  their  own  benefit  and  behoof 
the  fiction  that  Ohio  was  doubtful;  third,  because  until 
quite  recently  they  had  an  election  every  year  which  kept 
them  in  practice,  figuratively  speaking,  they  slept  on 
their  arms  with  one  eye  open;  fourth,  because  Ohio  had 
an  extraordinarily  able  set  of  public  men,  made  able  to  a 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  419 

large  extent  by  the  constant  campaigning  of  the  annual 
elections  and  the  limelight  resulting  therefrom.  Ohio 
had  such  a  plethora  of  aspiring  statesmen  that  they 
jostled  one  another  and  were  in  one  another's  way.  For 
example,  either  Chase  or  Wade  would  have  had  a  reason- 
able show  for  the  presidential  nomination  in  i860  had 
Ohio  been  united  on  one  of  them.  Either  Allen  or  Thur- 
man  might  have  won  in  1876,  but  both  running  put  Ohio 
out  of  the  reckoning.  The  same  remark  applies  somewhat 
to  Payne  and  Pendleton.  In  1880  Sherman  was  a  presi- 
dential candidate,  and  Garfield  walked  away  with  the 
glittering  prize,  very  much  to  the  disgust  of  Sherman 
and  his  friends.  Sherman  was  again  a  candidate  in  1884, 
but  the  Ohio  delegation  was  split.  In  1888  he  had  for 
the  first  time  a  solid  delegation  on  the  surface  from  his 
own  state,  though  one  big  Ohio  paper  declared  that  only 
fifteen  of  them  were  for  him  at  heart.  However  that 
may  be,  they  voted  solidly  for  him  so  long  as  he  seemed 
to  have  a  ghost  of  a  show,  and  even  after  that.  Mark 
Hanna  was  hoping  to  nominate  McKinley  if  Sherman 
failed,  while  Foraker  offers  persuasive  evidence  in  his 
book  that  he  could  have  been  nominated  himself  had 
Sherman  been  generous  enough  to  withdraw  when  Sher- 
man knew  he  had  no  chance  to  win  and  when  everybody 
else  in  that  convention  knew  the  same  thing.  Even  after 
Foraker  knew  that  his  presidential  cake  was  dough  he 
prevented  Taft  from  getting  a  solid  delegation  from  Ohio 
in  1908. 

Foraker  seems  to  me  to  be  the  most  pathetic  figure  in 
Ohio  politics.  He  was  an  exceptionally  handsome  and 
brilliant  figure.  He  was  rated  as  a  presidential  possi- 
bility for  twenty-five  years.  More  than  once  he  appeared 
to  be  a  presidential  probability;  but  something  fatal  to 
his  ultimate  ambition  always  happened.  Twice  he  placed 
John  Sherman  in  nomination  for  President.  Twice  he 
place4  McKinley  in  nomination  for  Governor,  and  twicQ 


420   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

for  President,  all  of  which  must  have  been  exceedingly 
distasteful  to  him.  He  was  nominated  for  Governor  four 
times,  elected  the  second  and  third  times,  defeated  the 
first  and  fourth.  Had  he  been  elected  the  fourth  heat  in 
1889  he  would  in  all  human  probabiHty  have  defeated 
Sherman  for  the  Senate  in  January,  1892,  and  might  have 
been  nominated  for  President  later  that  same  year;  but 
Sherman  defeated  him  decisively  for  Senator,  which  gave 
his  presidential  aspirations  a  solar-plexus  blow.  Finally 
he  attained  the  Senate  March  4,  1897,  the  same  day  that 
his  less  brilliant  and  less  eloquent  rival,  McKinley,  reached 
the  White  House. 

John  Adams,  who  had  a  temper  of  his  own,  and  who 
hated  Alexander  Hamilton,  of  New  York,  boss  of  the 
Federalists,  with  absolute  ferocity,  once  declared  with 
much  heat,  while  President,  that  "New  York  politics  is  the 
deviFs  own  mess."  It  is  really  a  pity  that  "the  Sage  of 
Braintree"  did  not  live  long  enough  to  render  an  opinion 
upon  the  intricacies,  plots,  counterplots,  and  betrayals  of 
Ohio  politics.  The  ordinary  span  of  human  life  is  not 
sufficient  time  in  which  to  understand  them.  It  may  well 
be  doubted  if  anybody  ever  did  completely  comprehend 
them  in  their  entirety  and  minutiae. 

So  far  as  men  and  measures  discussed  in  this  book  are 
concerned,  I  have  endeavored  to  write  the  truth  and  to 
treat  them  fairly.  Here  is  the  truth,  so  far  as  I  can  as- 
certain it  from  amazingly  contradictory  evidence  about 
Marcus  A.  Hanna. 

In  private  life  he  seems  to  have  been  kind-hearted, 
even  affectionate.  Physically  he  was  a  large  man,  and 
had  a  pleasant,  though  not  a  handsome,  face.  He  had 
been  solely  a  successful  business  man,  amassing  a  large 
fortune  while  still  in  his  prime,  never  running  for  office 
until  1897,  when  he  was  a  candidate  for  United  States 
Senator.  Until  he  was  appointed  to  the  Senate,  he  had 
participated  in  politics   for  his  friends  only,  by  electing 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  421 

delegates  to  state  and  national  conventions,  by  attending 
as  a  delegate  himself,  and  by  managing  campaigns  as 
state  and  national  chairman.  His  friendship  for  McKin- 
ley  grew  out  of  a  chance  meeting  while  the  latter  was  of 
counsel  in  a  lawsuit  against  him.  He  managed  McKin- 
ley's  campaign  for  both  nomination  and  election.  Croly 
says  he  paid  all  the  expenses  for  the  nomination  out  of 
his  own  pocket,  which  is  hard  to  believe.  Carrying  the 
election  was  dead  easy,  as  he  had  the  biggest  campaign 
fund  in  the  history  of  the  Republic.  Nevertheless,  as  he 
was  chairman,  he  reaped  a  great  reputation.  No  doubt 
his  friendship  for  McKinley — love  would  be  a  more  fitting 
word — lured  him  into  presidential  politics  in  1896,  for  he 
had  been  trying  for  twelve  years  to  find  a  presidential 
opening  for  his  idol.  No  man  in  American  history  was 
ever  more  savagely  abused  in  public  speech  or  the  public 
press.  He  was  openly  and  constantly  charged  with  buy- 
ing the  Presidency  for  his  protege.  Homer  Davenport, 
in  his  cartoons,  covered  him  with  dollar-marks  till  people 
came  to  regard  him  as  the  almighty  dollar  incarnate. 

One  day  during  the  extra  session  of  Congress  in  1897  I 
sent  my  httle  seven-year-old  son,  Bennett  Champ,  over  to 
the  Senate  with  a  note  for  Senator  Cockrell.  In  a  few  min- 
utes he  came  running  back  with  his  eyes  bulging  out,  and 
exclaimed:  "Daddy,  I  saw  Senator  Mark  Hanna  over 
there,  and  he  didn't  have  any  dollar-marks  on  him!" 
He  was  only  a  child,  but  his  report  tends  to  show  how 
thoroughly  the  dollar-mark  cartoon  had  done  its  work. 

When  he  entered  the  Senate  he  had  never  made  a  public 
speech  in  his  life,  though  verging  close  on  sixty.  No  one 
dreamed  that  he  would  become  a  strong  senatorial  de- 
bater, and  yet  that  is  precisely  what  he  did.  He  was 
panoplied  with  the  prestige  won  ,as  national  chairman, 
but  his  enemies  claimed  at  first  that  he  was  listened  to 
and  tolerated  as  a  debater  simply  because  he  had  a  great 
pull  with  the  administration  and  was  McKinley's  spokes- 


422   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

man;  but  it  gradually  dawned  on  the  American  mind 
that  he  was  a  really  strong  speaker.  The  fact  that  the 
great  canal  was  dug  across  the  Isthmus  of  Panama  instead 
of  across  Nicaragua  was  due  more  to  him  than  to  any 
other  man.  Those  who  heard  him  on  the  stump  united 
in  testifying  that  he  was  a  success  in  that  sort  of  speech- 
making — ^which  is  astonishing  when  it  is  remembered  that 
he  was  threescore  before  he  began  to  speak  in  public  on 
the  stage.  Another  remarkable  fact  is  that  millions  of 
people  thought  that  his  glory  was  only  reflected  from 
McKinley  and  that  when  McKinley  died  Hannahs  light 
would  be  gradually  dimmed  until  it  completely  disap- 
peared; but  as  a  matter  of  historic  truth  he  was  a  bigger 
man  after  the  President's  death  than  he  was  before. 
Long  before  he  died  all  the  elements  of  opposition  to 
President  Roosevelt  were  rallying  to  his  support  for  the 
presidential  nomination.  When  all  the  facts  are  con- 
sidered, his  career  after  he  entered  the  Senate  must  be 
taken  as  another  evidence  of  the  theory  that  the  average 
American  rises  equal  to  any  emergency  in  which  he  finds 
himself  placed. 

It  will  be  remembered  that  a  Republican  administra- 
tion conducted  the  war  with  Spain,  and  one  would  natu- 
rally conclude  that  the  glamour  attaching  to  that  brief 
and  highly  successful  conflict  would  give  the  Republicans 
prestige  so  great  as  to  enable  them  to  elect  the  House  ot 
Representatives  in  the  Fifty-sixth  Congress  easily  and 
by  an  overwhelming  majority.  Not  so,  however.  Quite 
the  contrary.  When  that  Congress  convened  they  had 
only  thirteen  majority.  A  change  of  seven  would  have 
given  the  Democrats  control.  I  have  always  believed, 
and  believe  now,  that  President  McKinley's  speaking 
tour  through  the  Central  West  won  the  victory  for  the 
RepubHcans.  Ostensibly  he  eschewed  politics;  but  every- 
body goes  to  hear  and  applaud  a  President — any  Presi- 
dent.    His  speeches  engender  enthusiasm,  and  enthusiasm 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  423 

is  as  contagious  as  smallpox  or  the  bubonic  plague.  Mc- 
Kinley  was  not  only  a  prince  of  stumpers,  but  was  Repub- 
licanism in  human  form.  He  stirred  his  audiences  to  the 
depths. 

So  eminent  a  Republican  as  Col.  William  Peters  Hep- 
burn told  me  that  the  President's  speeches  elected  him 
and  captured  the  House  of  Representatives. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

McKinley  and  Roosevelt. 

IT  IS  absolutely  certain  that  in  our  entire  history  no  two 
men  so  utterly  unlike  in  every  particular — in  thought, 
education,  manner,  personal  characteristics,  physique, 
tastes,  methods,  and  public  experience — ever  ran  for 
President  and  Vice-President  on  the  same  ticket  as  Will- 
iam McKinley  and  Theodore  Roosevelt.  In  every  way 
they  were  startling  contrasts.  If  the  Philadelphia  Re- 
publican National  Convention  of  1900  had  deliberately 
searched  the  land  from  sea  to  sea  for  the  sole  purpose  of 
finding  two  eminent  men  who  were  the  perfect  antipodes 
of  each  other,  they  could  not  have  succeeded  better  than 
when  it  selected  the  Major  and  the  Colonel  as  their 
standard-bearers. 

McKinley  was  one  of  the  gentlest,  most  modest,  most 
diplomatic,  and  most  gracious  of  all  our  public  men. 
Roosevelt  was  brusk,  abrupt,  self-assertive,  positive, 
and  the  most  aggressive  of  n:ortals.  McKinley  took 
everything  by  the  smooth  handle,  was  a  master  in  the 
art  of  pouring  oil  on  the  troubled  waters.  Roosevelt 
accomplished  his  purposes  by  the  lion's  paw  and  the 
eagle's  claw.  McKinley,  in  kindly  fashion,  persuaded 
men  to  comply  with  his  wishes.  Roosevelt  batted  them 
over  the  head  with  his  big  stick,  drove  straight  to  the 
mark,  and  compelled  acquiescence  in  his  purposes,  plans, 
and  ambitions.  McKinley  was  of  the  brunette  type,  with 
finely  chiseled  features,  and  with  an  astonishing  facial 
resemblance  to  Napoleon — a  fact  of  which  his  followers 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  425 

made  much  capital  and  his  opponents  much  fun.  Roose- 
velt was  of  the  blond  type,  with  rugged  features,  eviden- 
cing the  dynamic  force  of  which,  beyond  all  question,  he 
was  possessed — physically  resembling  no  other  historic 
character  whatsoever.  Mentally  and  physically  he  was 
sui  generis,  McKinley  acted  on  the  philosophy  that 
molasses  catches  more  flies  than  vinegar.  Roosevelt  be- 
lieved in  calling  a  spade  a  spade.  The  word  "liar"  was 
familiar  to  his  tongue,  and  he  founded  the  Ananias  Club, 
chose  its  members,  and  thrust  them  in.  McKinley  was 
delicately  framed,  weighed  about  a  hundred  and  sixty, 
and  was  five  feet  seven  and  one-fourth  inches  in  stature, 
but  he  had  a  way  of  walking,  expanding  his  chest  and 
carrying  his  head  which  made  him  appear  taller  and 
larger — in  which  he  resembled  Gen.  John  C.  Brecken- 
ridge,  of  Kentucky.  Roosevelt  was  nearly  six  feet  tall, 
weighed  above  two  hundred,  had  a  magnificent  body — 
which  he  kept  in  prime  condition — and  was  strong  as  a 
bull.  McKinley  was  of  sedentary  habit,  while  Roosevelt 
took  more  exercise  than  any  other  occupant  of  the  White 
House.  He  was  as  striking  an  example  of  what  physical 
culture  and  outdoor  life  will  do  in  converting  a  spindling 
boy  into  an  exceedingly  robust  man  of  rare  endurance  as 
could  be  found  betwixt  the  two  seas.  He  bounced  about 
like  a  rubber  ball  and  v/as  fond  of  associating  with  ath- 
letes, of  whom  he  was  one.  McKinley's  studies,  reading, 
and  speeches  all  ran  to  economics.  Roosevelt's  touched 
all  subjects  of  human  interest.  He  seemed  as  much  at 
home  in  one  place  as  another,  and  spoke  with  equal  cock- 
sureness  and  vehemence  on  all  topics,  whether  before 
the  learned  Academicians  of  the  Sorbonne,  or  in  Guild- 
hall explaining  to  the  gaping  and  dumfounded  Brit- 
ishers how  to  govern  Egypt,  or  making  a  stump  speech 
in  the  great  cities  and  on  wide  prairies  of  his  native  land. 
The  chances  are  that  McKinley  never  dreamed  of  writing 
a  book,  and  that  it  would  have  been  about  such  a  book 


426   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

as  John  Sherman  s  Memoirs,  one  of  the  dullest  of  all 
books,  if  he  had  attempted  it.  Roosevelt  was  a  vo- 
luminous author  on  a  variety  of  subjects — always  inter- 
esting, if  not  profound.  McKinley  was  not  a  collegian. 
Roosevelt  was  a  Harvard  man.  McKinley  was  a  de- 
vout Methodist.  Roosevelt  was  a  member  of  the  Dutch 
Reformed  Church.  McKinley  was  of  Scotch  descent. 
Roosevelt,  on  his  father's  side,  was  of  Dutch  extrac- 
tion, while  his  mother  was  a  Miss  Bullock,  of  Georgia. 
McKinley  taught  school,  practised  law,  was  prosecuting 
attorney,  long-time  Representative  in  Congress,  chair- 
man of  the  Committee  on  Ways  and  Means,  and 
Governor  of  Ohio.  Roosevelt  was  a  member  of  the 
Legislature  almost  before  his  beard  was  sprouted.  Police 
Commissioner  of  New  York,  Civil  Service  Commissioner, 
Assistant  Secretary  of  the  Navy,  Governor  of  New  York, 
and  Vice-President.  McKinley  was  reared  on  a  farm. 
Roosevelt  gathered  health  and  strength  as  a  cowboy  in 
Dakota.  With  neither  was  the  road  to  the  White  House 
smooth  all  the  way.  McKinley  was  unseated  in  a  con- 
test in  the  House  and  finally  beaten  for  re-election. 
Thomas  B.  Reed  defeated  him  by  only  two  votes  for  the 
Repubhcan  nomination  for  Speaker,  when  the  nomina- 
tion was  equivalent  to  the  election.  Roosevelt  was  de- 
feated for  the  mayoralty  of  New  York,  and  sadly  confided 
to  his  friends,  so  it  is  said,  that  his  political  career  was  at 
an  end — which  it  is  difficult,  indeed  impossible,  to  believe. 

They  were  both  soldiers — McKinley  in  the  Civil  War, 
ending  with  the  grade  of  major;  Roosevelt  in  the  Span- 
ish American  War,  with  the  rank  of  colonel.  Both  capi- 
tal stump  speakers  and  of  different  styles;  both  stanch 
Republicans — each  after  his  kind.  Both  masterful  poli- 
ticians by  methods  wide  apart  as  the  poles. 

I  have  always  said  that  had  McKinley  lived  out  his 
second  term  he  would  have  completely  disorganized  the 
Democrats  by  a  process  of  political  seduction,  in  which 


AMERICAN   POLITICS  427 

he  was  an  adept.  There  were  thirty  or  forty  Democrats 
in  the  House  completely  under  his  spell,  with  the  number 
constantly  growing.  Roosevelt  stirred  the  fighting  blood 
of  every  Democrat  worthy  of  the  name.  Many  were  his 
personal  friends,  but  he  cudgeled  Democrats  so  unmerci- 
fully that  they  fought  back  with  might  and  main. 

Defeat,  while  never  pleasant,  is  sometimes  a  blessing 
in  disguise.  No  doubt  McKinley  was  bitterly  disap- 
pointed when  Reed  achieved  the  Speakership  over  him, 
but  it  was  the  best  thing  that  ever  happened  to  him,  for 
Reed  appointed  him  chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Ways 
and  Means,  thereby  enabling  him  to  fasten  his  name  onto 
'*the  McKinley  bill,"  which  was  one  of  the  principal  fac- 
tors in  the  slaughter  of  the  Republicans  in  1890  and  1892, 
and,  strange  as  it  may  seem,  was  one  of  the  most  potent 
arguments  in  favor  of  McKinley's  nomination  and  elec- 
tion to  the  Presidency  in  1 896.  Another  thing  that  helped 
him  amazingly  was  the  stupidity  of  the  Ohio  Democratic 
Legislature,  which  gerrymandered  him  out  of  Congress  in 
1890.  The  American  people  like  a  square  deal,  and  the 
Ohio  folks  did  not  take  kindly  to  the  idea  of  treating  in 
that  manner  a  man  who  had  risen  so  high  in  the  councils 
of  the  nation.  So  they  unanimously  nominated  him  for 
Governor  in  1891,  and  again  in  1893,  and  triumphantly 
elected  him  both  times,  which  gave  him  the  coign  of  van- 
tage in  1896. 

Everybody  knows  what  Parson  Burchard  did  to  James 
Gillespie  Blaine.  McKinley  was  determined  that  no  such 
faux  pas  should  happen  in  his  campaign.  It  will  be 
remembered  that  McKinley  did  not  go  around  the  coun- 
try making  speeches,  but  that  numerous  delegations  of 
his  supporters  made  the  pilgrimage  to  Canton,  where  he 
addressed  them  from  his  front  porch.  That  method  of 
campaigning  has  lost  its  vogue  because  there  are  no  more 
free  railroad  passes! 

Former  Representative  James  T.  McCleary,  of  Minne- 


428   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

sota,  an  ardent  admirer  of  McKinley,  once  told  me  how 
determined  McKinley  was  that  he  should  not  be  **Bur- 
chardized,"  as  was  "the  Man  from  Maine."  So  he 
absolutely  refused  to  be  addressed  by  any  visiting  orator 
unless  the  orator's  speech  was  submitted  to  him  in  ad- 
vance. If  there  was  anything  objectionable  or  of  even 
doubtful  propriety  in  the  speech,  he  would  send  for  him 
and  tell  him  that  in  a  general  way  his  speech  was  admi- 
rable. Then  in  the  friendliest  manner  possible  he  would 
say:  "Of  course,  you  are  here  for  the  sole  purpose  of 
helping  to  elect  me,  and  that  is  why  you  have  prepared 
this  excellent  speech — for  all  of  which  I  am  profoundly 
grateful.  Now  permit  me  to  suggest  that  here  is  a  sen- 
tence which  might  perhaps  be  used  to  our  disadvantage. 
Do  you  not  think  it  should  be  erased?"  Of  course  the 
aspiring  orator  would  agree  to  the  deletion.  He  could 
not  do  anything  else,  as  the  possibility  of  offending  the 
probable  President  was,  above  all  things,  to  be  avoided. 
Consequently  McKinley  would  order  one  of  his  staff  to 
take  a  blunt-nibbed  pen  and  so  thoroughly  efface  the 
undesirable  sentence  that  no  human  eye,  even  if  aided 
by  the  most  powerful  microscope,  could  decipher  it. 
With  such  care  it  is  no  wonder  that  no  fatal  accident  hap- 
pened in  McKinley's  canvass.  Had  Blaine  censored  the 
parson's  speech  he  would  have  been  President  instead  of 
Grover  Cleveland,  for  there  can  be  no  shadow  of  doubt 
that  Burchard's  three  words  of  alliteration  changed  more 
than  the  five  hundred  and  odd  votes  necessary  to  be 
changed  to  send  the  Plumed  Knight  to  the  White  House. 
Blaine  always  asserted  that  he  did  not  hear  Burchard's 
fatal  alliteration — which  is  probably  true;  but  suppose 
he  had  heard  those  three  words  which  shut  the  White 
House  doors  in  his  face — what  then?  How  could  he,  on 
the  spur  of  the  moment,  have  said  anything  to  cure  the 
injury  wrought  by  the  preacher  without  at  the  same  time 
alienating  as  many  voters  as  he  gained  ?     I  have  worked 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  429 

on  that  problem  in  mental  gymnastics  a  good  deal,  but  I 
have  never  been  able  to  solve  the  riddle. 

Gen.  Winfield  Scott  acted  as  bis  own  Burchard  in  his 
remark  about  "the  hasty  plate  of  soup,"  and  his  scornful 
declaration  that  he  "never  read  The  New  York  Herald," 
His  illustrious  namesake.  Gen.  Winfield  Scott  Hancock, 
"the  Superb,"  performed  the  same  office  for  himself  by 
his  remark  to  the  effect  that  "the  tariff  is  a  local  ques- 
tion." That  and  Charles  A.  Dana's  malicious  squib  that 
"General  Hancock  is  a  good  man,  weighing  two  hundred 
and  fifty  pounds,"  greatly  militated  against  his  election. 

In  line  with  what  Mr.  McCleary  told  me  is  the  follow- 
ing extract  from  Mr.  Croly's  Life  of  Senator  Marcus  A, 
Hanna,  Speaking  of  the  paucity  of  letters  and  telegrams 
passing  between  Hanna  and  WiUiam  McKinley,  he  says: 

Only  about  a  score  of  letters  and  some  four  telegrams  .  .  .  and  the 
great  majority  of  these  are  trivial  in  character.  .  .  .  Mr.  McKinley  was 
in  all  his  political  relations  an  extremely  wary  man.  He  early  adopted 
the  practice  of  not  committing  to  paper  any  assertions  or  promises 
which  might  subsequently  prove  to  be  embarrassing;  and  even  in  the 
case  of  important  conversations  over  the  telephone  he  frequently  took 
the  precaution  of  having  a  witness  at  his  end  of  the  line.  It  is  scarcely 
to  be  expected  that  any  letters  of  his  will  be  of  much  assistance,  either 
to  his  own  biographer  or  that  of  any  political  associate,  in  spite  of,  or 
rather  because  of,  the  fact  that  McKinley  late  in  his  life  wrote  too 
many  of  his  letters  with  a  biographer  so  much  in  mind.  All  impor- 
tant matters  were  discussed  between  the  two  men  in  private  confer- 
ence.    Later  they  were  connected  by  a  special  telephone  service. 

In  quoting  that  excerpt  Senator  Joseph  Benson  Foraker, 
in  his  Notes  of  a  Busy  Life,  adds  this  cryptic  remark: 

One  might  infer  from  these  comments  that  if  the  dictagraph  had 
been  known  in  his  time,  McKinley  would  have  supplied  himself  with 
one  for  use  in  his  conferences. 

There  is  an  old  saying  which  runs  in  this  wise:  "Some 
men  are  born  great,  some  achieve  greatness,  and  some 


430   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

have  greatness  thrust  upon  them/'  So  far  as  can  be 
ascertained,  very  few  men  have  deliberately  gone  after 
the  Vice-Presidency,  because  the  nomination  of  candi- 
dates for  the  Presidency  generally  determines  the  nomi- 
nations for  Vice-President.  Usually  it  is  given  as  a  sop 
to  some  prominent  member  of  the  defeated  faction. 
Among  those  who  sought  it  and  captured  it  are  Schuyler 
Colfax,  Henry  Wilson,  and  Garrett  A.  Hobart.  White- 
law  Reid  secured  the  nomination,  but  was  defeated  at  the 
election. 

Colonel  Roosevelt  has  always  claimed  that  he  did  not 
desire  the  vice-presidential  nomination.  **If  so,"  his 
enemies  and  detractors  ask,  "why  did  he  wear  his  mili- 
tary cocked  hat  to  that  convention?  Simply  to  attract 
attention.?"  If  so,  he  overdid  it  and  attracted  so  much 
attention,  engendering  so  much  enthusiasm,  that  it 
enabled  that  astute  pohtician,  Thomas  CoUier  Piatt, 
aided  and  abetted  by  the  astuter  politician,  Matthew 
Stanley  Quay,  to  force  Senator  Marcus  A.  Hanna's  hand 
and  compel  the  nomination  of  Roosevelt.  Piatt's  sole 
aim  was  to  get  rid  of  Roosevelt  and  shelve  him  in  the 
Vice-Presidency.  It  is  said  that  Roosevelt  was  furious, 
though  it  was  a  streak  of  pure  good  luck  and  made  him 
President — ^which  otherwise  he  might  never  have  been. 
Senator  Piatt  was  happy  as  a  boy  with  his  first  pair  of 
red-topped  boots  at  having  "shelved  Roosevelt" — ^which, 
as  it  turned  out,  was  to  lead  to  his  own  political  undoing. 
He  was  hoisted  on  his  own  petard.  My  own  opinion  is 
that  Roosevelt  was  honest  in  saying  that  he  did  not  want 
the  Vice-Presidency.  Why,  then,  the  military  cocked 
hat?  Because  he  wanted  to  set  people  to  talking  about 
him  so  as  to  aid  him  in  grabbing  a  presidential  nomina- 
tion in  1904.  From  the  time  when  he  first  learned  there 
is  such  a  high  and  mighty  ofl&ce  he  began  chasing  it. 

He  was  as  active  as  a  cat,  energetic  as  a  steam-engine, 
industrious  as  the  law  of  gravitation,  ambitious  as  C«sar% 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  431 

So  long  as  life  lasted  he  was  a  factor — an  important 
factor — in  human  affairs. 

One  reason  why  McKinley  was  at  all  times  in  perfect 
peace,  if  not  in  absolute  accord,  with  Congress  was  that 
he  had  served  many  years  in  the  House  and  understood 
thoroughly  and  well  its  idiosyncrasies,  its  prejudices,  its 
jealousies,  its  clannishness,  and  its  esprit  de  corps;  and  one 
reason  why  Roosevelt  had  such  an  uproarious  and  un- 
pleasant experience  with  the  Congress  was  that  he  had 
never  served  in  either  House  or  Senate,  did  not  under- 
stand them,  and  did  not  care  a  fig  what  they  thought, 
thereby  creating  superfluous  and  unfortunate  frictions 
and  antagonisms.  The  one  was  a  diplomat;  the  other 
a  fighter. 

The  late  Richard  W.  Austin,  of  the  Knoxville,  Tennes- 
see, district,  once  the  home  of  both  Andrew  Johnson  and 
**  Parson  *'  Brownlow,  was  a  most  lovable  man  who  boasted 
that  he  never  voted  for  a  tax  or  against  an  appropriation. 
By  his  famihars  he  is  called  "Alabama  Dick/'  because 
while  a  citizen  of  that  state  he  had  the  temerity  to  run 
twice  on  the  Republican  ticket  for  Congress  against  Gen. 
Joe  Wheeler,  which  most  Democrats  considered  a  species 
of  sacrilege.  Austin  found  the  political  pastures  greener 
and  more  lush  in  East  Tennessee,  where  there  are  more 
RepubHcans  to  the  square  inch  than  anywhere  else  on 
earth. 

Austin  was  fond  of  telling  stories  to  illustrate  the  rich 
humor  of  his  long-time  friend  and  erstwhile  colleague, 
Walter  P.  Brownlow.  Everybody  knows  that  while  in 
the  House  President  McKinley  was  a  strong  advocate 
of  silver.  So  was  Brownlow.  Austin  said  that  in  1896 
Brownlow  was  stumping  East  Tennessee  and  making  red- 
hot  speeches  for  McKinley,  but  also  whooping  it  up  at 
a  lively  rate  for  free  silver  coinage.  Mr.  Chairman  Marcus 
A.  Hanna,  of  the  Republican  National  Committee,  heard 
of  it,  and  in  great  perturbation  of  spirit  wrote  Brownlow  to 


432   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

cut  out  his  advocacy  of  silver,  since  Major  McKinley  was 
running  as  the  Sound  Money  candidate  on  a  gold-standard 
platform.  Brownlow  answered  somewhat  in  this  wise: 
"Dear  Mr.  Chairman,  I  regret  exceedingly  if  I  have 
offended.  The  most  eloquent  Silver  speech  I  ever  heard 
fall  from  human  lips  was  made  by  Major  McKinley  some 
years  ago.  I  did  not  know  he  had  changed  his  views, 
and  was  going  up  and  down  quoting  his  remarks  on  the 
coinage  question.  I  will,  however,  conform  my  speech 
to  your  suggestions,  but  I  beg  of  you  that,  should  he  again 
change  his  views,  you  will  telegraph  me  notice  in  advance 
so  that  I  can  still  work  in  harmony  with  our  great  leader!" 

When  Colonel  Roosevelt  chose  he  could  make  himself 
very  agreeable  indeed.  His  large  and  varied  store  of 
information,  his  peculiarly  emphatic  style  of  conversa- 
tion— which  frequently  ran  into  monologue — his  expe- 
riences as  hunter,  soldier,  traveler,  discoverer,  pubHc 
speaker,  statesman,  author,  cowboy,  his  intense  earnest- 
ness, his  amazing  success  in  many  fields  of  human  en- 
deavor, his  rare  and  infectious  enthusiasm — these  things 
rendered  him  a  unique  and  commanding  figure  in  any 
company.  With  his  friends  he  was  free  and  easy,  not 
being  overloaded  with  dignity. 

When  in  1903  he  made  his  long  electioneering  trip  to 
Oregon,  he  traveled  through  my  Congressional  district 
for  about  one  hundred  miles  via  the  Burlington  Railroad. 
My  constituents  asked  me  to  introduce  him  at  the  various 
stopping-places,  which  I  was  glad  to  do.  He  and  I  were 
on  good  terms,  and  it  was  a  courtesy  I  owed  him.  I  did 
not  suppose  that  anybody  would  try  to  hurt  him,  but  I 
thought  I  might  prevent  the  over-enthusiastic  or  over- 
stimulated  from  annoying  him  with  demonstrations  too 
intimate  or  too  boisterous  in  their  nature.  I  met  him  at 
Hannibal,  where  he  addressed  a  fine  audience,  composed 
largely  of  Democrats,  who  cheered  him  to  the  echo  and 
**threw  high  their  sweaty  caps  in  air,"  for  he  was  very 


AMERICAN   POLITICS  433 

popular  in  Missouri — a  fact  mathematically  demon- 
strated when  he  carried  that  rock-ribbed  Democratic 
stronghold  in  November,  1904,  by  thirty  thousand 
majority,  being  the  first  Republican  presidential  candi- 
date to  carry  it  subsequent  to  1868.  I  have  been  told 
that  he  was  very  proud  of  that  fact — his  pride  being  thor- 
oughly justified,  for  it  was  far  more  a  personal  than  a 
political  triumph. 

When  we  boarded  his  special  train  he  invited  Howard 
Elliott,  Judge  Adams,  Judge  Dyer,  United  States  Marshal 
Morsey,  and  myself,  with  perhaps  some  others,  to  lunch 
with  him  in  his  private  car.  It  was  an  entirely  informal 
affair.  Merriment  was  unconfined.  He  was  in  high 
feather,  being  hugely  pleased  with  his  reception  in  Mis- 
souri.    Everybody  chipped  into  the  conversation. 

It  so  happened  that  while  on  his  long  journey  one  of 
his  small  sons  had  the  measles.  The  boy  wanted  to  go 
to  the  barn  to  see  his  Shetland  pony.  His  mother  would 
not  let  him  go,  fearing  that  he  might  catch  cold.  So  the 
little  chap  induced  the  colored  hostler  to  take  the  tiny 
pony  into  the  White  House  basement,  put  him  into  the 
elevator,  and  hoist  him  up-stairs  to  his  room.  I  asked 
the  President  what  he  thought  of  that  performance. 
"Bully!"  he  exclaimed.  "By  George!  it's  the  funniest 
caper  I  ever  heard  of.  Don't  you  know  that  boy  thinks 
more  of  that  colored  man  than  he  does  of  me?'*  and  he 
threw  his  head  back  and  laughed  so  uproariously  as  to 
be  heard  above  the  rattle  of  the  train.  I  told  him  that 
was  usually  the  case  with  boys  reared  with  colored  folks. 

I  had  an  experience  with  him  which  demonstrated  in  a 
pleasing  way  his  kindness  of  heart.  At  a  certain  stage 
of  the  p re-convention  canvass  it  looked  as  though  Sena- 
tor Marcus  A.  Hanna  would  give  the  President  a  hard 
tussle  for  the  Republican  nomination.  Of  course  it  was 
none  of  my  business  who  won  among  the  Republicans, 
but  I  believed  the  Republican  nominee  would  secure  the 

Vol.  I.— 28 


434   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

election,  and  also  believed  Roosevelt  to  be  the  better  man 
of  the  two.  Therefore  I  wanted  to  see  him  nominated. 
The  Republican  situation  in  Missouri  did  not  look  pro- 
pitious for  him.  The  Hanna  men  constituted  only  about 
two-fifths  of  the  Republicans  in  the  state,  but  they  were 
seasoned  veterans,  well  organized,  while  Roosevelt's  fol- 
lowers, constituting  about  three-fifths,  were  leaderless  and 
unorganized.  I  concluded  that  a  friendly  tip  from  a  dis- 
interested Democratic  friend  well  acquainted  in  the  state 
might  help  him.  So  one  morning  I  went  over  to  the 
White  House,  accompanied  by  my  son,  Bennett  Champ, 
lately  a  colonel  in  our  army  in  France,  then  a  chunk  of 
a  boy.  After  talking  to  the  President  about  two  or  three 
small  matters  of  official  business  I  said,  "Mr.  President, 
some  time  before  long,  if  you  can  find  a  few  minutes  of 
leisure,  let  me  know  and  I  will  come  down  and  tell  you 
something  to  your  personal  advantage  of  a  political 
nature."  He  repHed:  "Wait  till  I  can  get  rid  of  these 
people" — ^waving  his  hand  toward  a  bevy  of  folks — "and 
we'll  have  that  talk  now."  After  his  visitors  departed 
he  and  I,  followed  by  my  young  son,  went  into  his  private 
room.  He  and  I  sat  down  on  a  sofa,  and  I  began  to 
explain  to  him  how  to  capture  the  thirty-six  Missouri 
delegates  to  the  convention  by  sending  for  a  half-dozen 
men  whom  I  named,  and  setting  them  to  organizing  his 
forces,  etc. 

He  had  a  magnificent  stuffed  eagle  on  his  table,  and  my 
son  was  examining  the  splendid  bird  with  much  pleasure 
and  curiosity.  Right  in  the  middle  of  my  explanation 
of  how  he  could  bag  the  Missouri  delegates  the  President 
noticed  the  boy's  admiration  of  his  eagle.  He  left  me, 
went  over  to  where  the  boy  and  eagle  were,  explained 
what  sort  of  eagle  he  was,  where  he  came  from,  who  pre- 
sented him,  how  he  was  differentiated  from  all  other 
eagles,  and  how  he  was  made  to  stand  erect.  Then  he 
delivered  a  short  lecture  on  taxidermy  that  would  have 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  435 

done  credit  to  any  professional  in  the  land.  The  boy  was 
dehghted,  and  so  was  I.  Then  the  President  came  back 
to  the  sofa  and  I  finished  my  message,  for  which  he 
thanked  me  very  cordially  and  on  which  he  said  he  would 
act.  Senator  Hanna,  however,  died  shortly  after,  and 
the  colonel  had  no  opposition  for  the  nomination. 

Most  assuredly  the  President  who  would  take  such 
pains  to  please  and  instruct  a  little  boy  whom  he  had 
never  seen  before  and  would  probably  never  see  again 
was  a  kind-hearted  man.  That  is  one  of  my  most  pleas- 
ant memories  of  this  most  extraordinary  man. 

It  is  generally  beheved  that  Colonel  Roosevelt  monop- 
olized the  talking  part  on  all  occasions.  He  did  gener- 
ally, but  not  always.  Once  a  bunch  of  distinguished 
Missourians,  headed  by  Walter  WiUiams,  dean  of  the 
Missouri  School  of  JournaHsm,  one  of  the  most  briUiant 
men  in  the  state,  came  to  Washington  to  invite  the  Presi- 
dent to  deliver  the  address  to  the  graduates  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Missouri.  They  stopped  at  the  Willard  and 
asked  the  Missouri  delegation  in  the  House  and  Senate 
to  accompany  them  and  back  up  their  invitation.  I  hap- 
pened to  walk  over  to  the  White  House  with  WilHams. 
En  route  I  asked  him  who  was  to  speak  for  them.  He 
replied  that  he  was.  So  I  said:  "I  will  give  you  a  word 
of  caution.  The  President  has  the  reputation  of  doing 
all  the  talking  in  such  matters.  If  you  let  him  break  in 
on  you  you  will  never  finish  your  speech."  WilHams  evi- 
dently pondered  my  words  in  his  heart,  for  as  soon  as  I 
introduced  them  he  began  his  remarks,  and  shot  them 
into  the  President  with  the  rapidity  of  an  automatic 
pistol.  The  latter  several  times  Hfted  his  right  hand, 
clenched  his  fist,  shook  his  head,  opened  his  mouth,  and 
started  to  speak,  but  WilHams  kept  firing  into  him  till  he 
got  through — very  much  to  his  own  surprise  and  to  that 
of  the  President,  and  of  everybody  else  within  ear-shot. 
Truth  to  tell,  I  think  the  President  admired  Williams  for 


436   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

his  nerve.  At  any  rate,  he  seemed  in  high  good  humor, 
and  after  some  jovial  remarks  promised  to  accept  the 
invitation,  provided  he  did  not  find  it  incompatible  with 
public  business. 

This  same  Walter  Williams  was  author  of  the  finest 
epigram  made  in  a  quarter  of  a  centuiy.  Among 
other  things  he  was  superintendent  of  the  biggest  Sunday- 
school  in  America.  One  morning  in  a  speech  to  his  flock 
he  said,  "Young  gentlemen.  Fame  has  snatched  men  from 
the  plow,  the  forge,  and  the  carpenter's  bench,  but  Fame 
never  reached  over  a  picket  fence  and  yanked  a  dude  out 
of  a  hammock." 

On  another  occasion  I  was  at  the  White  House  to  keep 
an  appointment  with  President  Roosevelt.  The  Texas 
delegation  was  ahead  of  me  to  urge  the  appointment  of 
ex-Gov.  Joseph  D.  Sayers  as  Panama  Canal  Commis- 
sioner. It  was  hot  weather,  the  doors  were  open,  and, 
while  not  eavesdropping,  I  could  not  help  hearing  what 
they  were  saying.  As  I  had  served  in  the  House  with 
Sayers,  I  was  anxious  to  know  how  they  came  out.  As 
they  were  leaving  I  inquired.  One  of  them  said:  "We 
don't  know.  I  don't  see  how  the  President  ever  learned 
anything,  for  he  persists  in  doing  all  the  talking.  He 
does  not  give  anybody  else  a  chance.  We  told  him 
that  all  Texas  wanted  Governor  Sayers  appointed  Canal 
Commissioner,  and  started  in  to  tell  him  about  Sayers — 
but  we  never  got  any  farther.  He  took  the  conversation 
away  from  us,  told  us  all  about  the  Governor  and  all 
about  the  Canal;  how  he  was  going  to  have  it  constructed, 
and  how  much  it  would  benefit  the  world  in  general  and 
America  in  particular.  He  expanded  on  the  history  of 
canals,  especially  the  Suez  Canal.  He  wound  up  by 
giving  us  an  extended  biography  of  Count  De  Lesseps — 
but  what  the  prospects  of  Governor  Sayers  for  that  canal 
commissionership  are  I  don't  know!" 

I  had  an  experience  with  him  which  illustrates  his 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  437 

wonderful  memory  and  industry.  Once  upon  a  time 
seven  cadets  at  Annapolis  were  court-martialed  and  dis- 
missed from  the  Academy.  Among  them  was  one  whom 
I  had  nominated — son  of  a  Republican  postmaster,  who 
had  won  it  in  a  competitive  examination  which  I  ordered. 
The  boy  wrote  me  that  he  had  not  had  a  fair  trial.  Con- 
sequently I  went  to  Mr.  Secretary  of  the  Navy  Bonaparte 
to  examine  the  transcript  of  the  proceedings.  The  boy 
was  charged  with  having  stood  five  other  cadets  on  their 
heads — not  a  monstrous  crime,  but  everybody  was  tired 
of  hazing,  and  he  was  thrown  out.  I  read  every  word  of 
the  testimony  (seven  pages  closely  typewritten  legal  cap) 
and  found  that  the  evidence  fully  sustained  the  five 
counts  of  guilty  by  the  court  martial.  As  his  offenses 
were  not  heinous,  I  inquired  of  Mr.  Secretary  Bonaparte 
if  he  thought  the  President  would  approve  the  findings 
of  the  court  martial.     He  said,  ^*Yes." 

A  few  days  later  somebody  told  me  that  the  chairman 
of  the  Naval  Affairs  Committee  in  the  House  was  going 
to  introduce  a  joint  resolution  authorizing  the  President 
to  reinstate  two  of  the  seven  expelled  cadets,  and  that 
my  cadet  was  not  one  of  the  two.  I  went  to  the  chairman 
and  asked  him  if  the  report  was  true.  He  said  it  was. 
I  told  him  I  would  defeat  his  resolution  if  it  was  the  last 
act  of  my  life.  I  was  willing  all  should  get  back  or  all 
should  stay  out,  but  that  they  should  not  make  fowl  of 
some  and  fish  of  others.  He  gave  up  the  idea,  and  I 
heard  no  more  about  it. 

Just  two  days  before  the  session  ended,  however,  I 
learned  that  Senator  Hale  of  Maine,  chairman  of  the 
Senate  Naval  Committee,  had  secured  the  passage  of  a 
Senate  joint  resolution  authorizing  the  President  to  re- 
instate any  or  all  of  the  seven,  as  appeared  to  him  best 
for  the  public  service — a  polite  way  of  whipping  his 
Satanic  Majesty  around  the  stump.  Next  morning  I 
went  to  see  the  President.    I  knew  that  if  I  did  not  save 


438   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

my  cadet  before  the  House  passed  the  Senate  joint  reso- 
lution I  could  not  save  him  afterward,  because  the  Presi- 
dent and  I  were  both  billed  to  leave  Washington  the 
moment  the  Congress  adjourned,  and  that  I  would  have 
no  chance  to  see  him.  In  my  interview  with  him  I  said: 
"Mr.  President,  if  the  Hale  resolution  about  those  seven 
expelled  naval  cadets  passes  the  House,  do  you  purpose 
to  reinstate  my  cadet?"  "No,  sir;  no,  sir,''  he  replied. 
"He  is  a  bad  egg  and  I  will  not  reinstate  him."  "All 
right,"  I  answered.  "I  will  kill  the  resolution.  As  there 
are  only  two  days  left,  I  can  kill  it,  and  will  kill  it." 
Then  he  started  in  to  tell  me  about  my  cadet's  case.  I 
said:  "Mr.  President,  if  you  are  not  going  to  reinstate 
him  there  is  no  use  in  wasting  your  time  talking  about  it." 
He  repHed  that  he  was  going  to  tell  me  for  his  own  satis- 
faction. Thereupon  he  repeated  substantially  the  entire 
transcript  of  seven  closely  typewritten  pages  of  legal  cap, 
and  wound  up  by  saying:  "He  was  convicted  on  five 
counts,  and  if  you  and  I  had  been  sitting  on  that  court 
martial  we  would  both  have  voted  for  conviction." 

Then  he  proceeded  to  repeat  the  transcripts  in  the  other 
six  cases.  Among  other  things  he  said:  "You  know  that 
I  am  not  seeking  opportunities  to  please  Senator  Tillman, 
but  his  cadet  was  guilty  only  of  a  bare  technical  violation 
of  the  rules.  If  the  court  martial  had  had  any  sense  it 
would  have  given  him  some  slight  punishment  and  would 
not  have  expelled  him.  I  am  going  to  reinstate  him  in 
spite  of  Senator  Tillman,  if  the  Hale  resolution  passes  the 
House" — ^which  it  did  not  do,  for  I  killed  it  dead  as  a 
door-nail. 

I  left  the  White  House  marvehng  at  such  manifestation 
of  the  prodigious  memory  of  the  President,  who  had  so 
many  more  important  things  to  carry  around  in  his  head. 
I  wonder  yet  how  he  found  time  in  his  multitudinous 
employments  to  digest  those  forty-nine  pages  of  tran- 
scripts of  trials  of  seven  naval  cadets. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  439 

Here  Is  another  illustration  of  President  Roosevelt's 
industry  and  many-sidedness.  One  morning  at  the 
White  House  I  was  third  in  the  procession,  or  reception 
line.  Representative  Granger  of  Rhode  Island,  a  mild- 
mannered  man,  had  with  him  a  half-dozen  prominent 
Jews.  They  presented  a  petition  signed  by  thousands  of 
their  brethren,  asking  that  the  President  send  our  fleet 
into  the  North  Sea  to  overawe  the  Russians  and  to  com- 
pel them  to  treat  the  Jews  with  justice.  He  flew  into  a 
passion,  and  the  way  he  roasted  Granger  and  the  Jews 
was  enough  to  make  each  particular  hair  to  stand  on  end 
like  quills  upon  the  fretful  porcupine,  and  wound  up  by 
exclaiming  loud  enough  for  a  large  roomful  of  people  to 
hear,  "What  in  God's  name  would  the  world  think  of  us 
if  we  undertook  to  bully  the  Russian  government  into 
changing  its  policy  toward  the  Russian  Jews,  while  we 
are  constantly  lynching  colored  citizens  down  South?" 
— ^which  greatly  abashed  Representative  Granger  and  his 
friends.     They  departed  sorrowfully. 

Next  entered  "the  august  presence"  a  handsome, 
fashionably  dressed,  inteUigent  woman  of  Hibernian  ex- 
traction, with  whom  the  President  seemed  to  be  ac- 
quainted, for  he  greeted  her  most  cordially.  She  started 
in  to  discuss  with  him  the  relative  merits  of  certain  Irish 
poets.  He  cut  her  oflF  in  the  middle  of  a  sentence  by 
saying:  "My  dear  madam,  I  have  no  time  to  discuss  the 
Irish  poets  to-day,  but  if  you  will  buy  the  current  number 
of  such  and  such  a  magazine  you  will  find  a  forty-page 
article  which  I  wrote  on  'The  Irish  Sagas T*  Whether 
she  bought  one  I  do  not  know,  but  I  did,  to  see  if  he 
was  stringing  her  to  be  rid  of  her.  Sure  enough  there 
was  the  article.  Again  I  wondered  how  he  found  time  to 
do  such  things  as  that;  and  the  mystery  has  never  been 
cleared  up. 

Sometimes  he  seemed  to  be  animated  by  the  imp  of  the 
perverse,  touching  which  Edgar  Allan  Poe  wrote  some 


440   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

weird  stories;  and  he  appeared  to  enjoy  shocking  people 
as  much  as  Poe  did.  When  the  corner-stone  of  the  vast 
marble  pile  denominated  the  House  Office  Building  was 
laid  the  President  was  the  orator  of  the  day.  He  was  in 
fine  fettle.  It  was  a  lovely  day  in  May.  The  audience 
was  large  and  distinguished.  The  ladies  were  decked  out 
in  their  best  bibs  and  tuckers.  The  men  wore  their 
Sunday  clothes.  We  were  all  there  to  have  a  good  time. 
The  President  sailed  in.  He  made  a  flamboyant  Fourth- 
of-July  speech  for  ten  minutes,  an  uplift  speech  for  fifteen, 
skinned  the  muckrakers  within  an  inch  of  their  lives,  and 
delivered  a  few  light  taps  on  Democratic  ribs.  The 
mouths  of  the  eminent  Republican  magnates  were  spread 
in  smiles  reaching  from  ear  to  ear.  They  were  having 
the  time  of  their  lives,  when  suddenly,  without  any  con- 
nection whatever  with  anything  he  had  said,  apropos  of 
nothing,  he  declared  vehemently  for  both  a  graduated 
income  tax  and  a  graduated  inheritance  tax.  The  Dem- 
ocrats were  jubilant  and  applauded  hilariously,  while 
the  smiles  froze  on  the  faces  of  the  Republicans.  They 
would  not  have  been  more  astonished  if  he  had  struck 
them  betwixt  the  eyes  with  a  maul.  They  had  to  pinch 
themselves  to  see  if  they  were  awake.  The  President 
seemed  to  be  delighted  with  the  sensation  he  had  created 
and  the  consternation  which  he  had  wrought  among  Re- 
publican statesmen.  Their  curses  on  him  for  that  speech 
were  not  only  deep,  but  loud. 

When  I  was  a  very  young  man  attending  the  Cincin- 
nati Law-school  I  was  at  a  mammoth  Democratic  mass- 
meeting  in  the  Grand  Opera  House  to  protest  against 
Gen.  Philip  H.  Sheridan's  action  in  pitching  the  Louisiana 
Legislature  out  of  the  windows  with  his  bayonets.  I 
should  say  one  of  the  Louisiana  Legislatures,  for  they  had 
two  of  them — hence  the  row.  At  the  mass-meeting  afore- 
mentioned excitement  ran  high.  The  Buckeye  orators 
were  out  in  full  forc^.    They  made  the  rafters  ring,  an4 


AMERICAN   POLITICS  441 

split  the  welkin  with  their  hot  and  indignant  eloquence. 
At  last  appeared  United  States  Senator  George  H.  Pen- 
dleton— "Gentleman  George,"  as  he  was  universally 
called — ^then  in  the  prime  of  his  manly  beauty  and  splen- 
did powers.  To  witness  the  ovation  given  him  was  worth 
ten  years  of  peaceful  life.  I  say  again  that  were  I  to  dis- 
count the  remarkable  age  of  Methuselah  I  would  never 
forget  his  opening  sentence — "The  sweetest  incense  that 
ever  greeted  the  nostrils  of  a  public  man  is  the  applause 
of  the  people" — as  exquisite  a  mot  as  was  ever  uttered. 

Perhaps  President  Roosevelt  never  heard  of  Pendleton's 
saying,  but  he  seemed  to  be  of  Hke  mind,  for  it  may  be 
safely  stated  that  no  man  ever  more  thoroughly  enjoyed 
J  popular  applause  than  did  he — certainly  no  man  ever 
received  more  of  it.  When  he  made  his  famous  trip 
down  the  Mississippi  by  boat  he  was  met  by  a  tremen- 
dous concourse  of  hysterically  cheering  people  at  the  St. 
Louis  wharf.  He  was  to  speak  at  the  Jai  Alai  Building 
some  three  or  four  miles  from  the  river.  He  went  out  in 
an  automobile,  through  lanes  of  shouting  people,  the  rain 
pouring  down  in  torrents.  He  stood  up  bareheaded  to 
return  the  greetings  of  the  multitude.  The  committee 
begged  him  to  sit  down  under  an  umbrella.  He  replied: 
"No,  if  these  good  people  are  eager  enough  to  see  me  to 
stand  in  this  heavy  rain  for  hours,  they  shall  not  be  disap- 
pointed of  their  pleasure." 

On  arriving  at  the  Jai  Alai  he  was  soaked  to  the  skin. 
He  began  his  speech  with  this  witticism:  "If  this  speech 
is  dry,  it's  the  only  dry  thing  about  me!" 

These  things  which  I  have  set  down  here  are  not  among 
his  great  achievements,  but  they  are  pleasant  incidents  of 
his  busy  life. 

The  important  acts  and  far-resounding  utterances  on 
which  the  towering  fabric  of  his  fame  is  bottomed  have 
been  so  often  printed  in  books,  magazines,  and  news- 
papers— so  often  described  and  repeated  on  the  stump, 


442   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

on  the  platform,  in  the  pulpit,  and  in  the  Congress — that 
to  discuss  them  here  would  be  a  work  of  supererogation. 
The  world  knows  them  by  heart;  but  it  gives  me  un- 
feigned pleasure  to  throw  these  side-lights  upon  the  char- 
acter and  career  of  the  most  extraordinary  man  who  has 
filled  the  presidential  chair. 

It  may  be  of  interest  to  state  that  in  191 2  three  presi- 
dential candidates.  President  Taft,  Governor  Harmon, 
and  myself,  graduated  at  or  from — or  to  use  the  formula 
of  Senator  Henry  Cabot  Lodge,  "were  graduated  from" — 
the  Cincinnati  Law-school;  but  the  Princetonian  walked 
away  "with  the  bacon." 

Of  all  the  fantastic  capers  that  President  Roosevelt 
ever  cut  before  high  heaven,  the  most  astounding  and 
bizarre  was  his  performance  at  the  Gridiron  Club  in 
January,  1907. 

The  Gridiron  is  the  most  famous  club  in  America.  Its 
active  membership  is  composed  entirely  of  Washington 
newspaper  men  and  is  limited  to  forty,  in  that  regard 
resembling  the  French  "Immortals."  It  has  a  long  wait- 
ing-list— also  a  small  number  of  honorary  members.  The 
original  design  was  that  it  should  be  a  good-fellowship 
society.  While  that  idea  has  not  been  abandoned,  it 
has  gradually  taken  on  other  and  more  serious  features, 
some  of  a  political  tinge.  To  attend  one  of  its  banquets 
with  its  "show,"  skits,  songs,  humor,  speeches,  and  im- 
personations is  a  rare  treat,  provided  you  know  positively 
that  you  will  not  be  called  upon  to  speak.  When  a  pub- 
lic man  is  first  invited  as  a  guest  he  knows  that  he  has 
been  recognized  as  a  "comer."  Most  of  the  prominent 
men  of  two  generations  have  stretched  their  legs  under 
Gridiron  mahogany.  Most  of  the  successful  public 
speakers — and  some  not  successful — have  exercised  their 
voices  in  Gridiron  banquet-halls. 

The  invitations  are  sent  without  solicitation.  They 
cannot  be  bought.     In  fact,  an  effort  to  buy  one,  or  an 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  443 

intimation  by  any  man  that  he  would  be  willing  to  pay, 
is  taken  in  bad  part  by  the  Gridironers. 

They  have  two  rules:  First,  "Ladies  are  always  pres- 
ent"— ^which  they  never  are;  second,  "Reporters  are 
never  present" — and  they  always  are,  in  large  numbers 
at  that. 

The  first  rule  is  fair  warning  to  all  speakers — to  use  only 
chaste  language. 

The  second  rule  is  to  have  guests  speak  their  minds 
freely — knowing  that  their  remarks  will  not  be  reported. 

It  is  a  hundred-to-one  shot  that  any  orator  that  vio- 
lated the  spirit  of  rule  one  would  never  receive  another 
invitation  to  a  Gridiron  banquet. 

Even  rule  two  was  violated  on  one  notable  occasion, 
without  the  club's  consent,  as  I  shall  relate. 

At  least  one  of  President  Wilson's  speeches  was  pub- 
lished with  the  consent  of  the  club. 

At  the  January  banquet  of  1907  a  startHng  and  thrilHng 
stunt  was  pulled  off — the  most  startling  and  thrilling  I  ever 
witnessed,  absolutely  unique  and  unprecedented  in  char- 
acter, and  perhaps  never  to  be  duplicated  in  this  world. 

I  saw  and  heard  a  debate  before  two  or  three  hundred 
men  between  President  Roosevelt  and  Senator  Joseph 
Benson  Foraker,  of  Ohio.  According  to  my  judgment — 
to  use  pugilistic  parlance — the  bout  ended  in  a  draw, 
though  the  sympathy  of  the  majority  of  the  audience  was 
with  the  Senator  because  he  was  attacked  by  the  Presi- 
dent and  was  therefore  fighting  on  the  defensive.  It  is 
only  truth  and  justice  to  say  that  he  held  his  own  fairly 
well  that  night;  but  it  is  also  only  truth  and  justice  to 
say  that  that  debate  was  the  culmination  of  the  feud 
betwixt  him  and  the  President,  which  practically  elim- 
inated him  as  a  presidential  candidate.  No  doubt  when 
Colonel  Roosevelt  recalled  that  night  he  remembered 
the  old  saw:  "He  laughs  best  who  laughs  last,"  for  his 
was  the  final  triumph. 


444   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

The  chief  matter  in  controversy  betwixt  them  was  the 
action  of  the  President  in  discharging  a  whole  battaHon 
of  colored  troops  at  Brownsville,  Texas,  without  honor. 
It  was  claimed  that  some  ten  or  fifteen  colored  troopers 
shot  up  the  town  one  night,  killed  one  man,  wounded 
another,  fired  into  a  building,  and  conducted  themselves 
generally  in  a  most  obstreperous  and  offensive  way. 

Senator  Foraker  had  introduced  a  resolution  to  investi- 
gate the  whole  matter,  and  got  it  through  the  Senate. 
President  Roosevelt,  not  being  able  to  find  out,  after  all 
sorts  of  investigations,  which  particular  men  committed 
the  outrage,  discharged  the  whole  battalion  without 
honor. 

In  commenting  in  the  House  on  the  Brownsville  row,  I 
said,  among  other  things,  that  it  had  eliminated  Senator 
Foraker  from  the  presidential  equation  and  defeated  him 
for  Senator. 

In  his  book  entitled  Notes  of  a  Busy  Life — ^which,  by  the 
way,  is  what  Horace  Greeley  would  have  called  "very 
interesting  reading,"  and  what  Professor  Squeers,  of 
Dotheboys  Hall,  would  have  denominated  "richness" — he 
says  that  I  was  right  in  the  first  proposition;  that  is, 
that  the  Brownsville  affair  eliminated  him  from  the  presi- 
dential race;  but  that  I  was  wrong  about  it  defeating  him 
for  the  Senate.  However  that  may  be,  these  two  eminent 
gentlemen  had  it  out  at  the  Gridiron  Club,  to  the  utter 
amazement  of  all  within  sound  of  their  voices. 

Here  is  the  setting  of  the  scene:  A  table  on  a  raised 
platform  ran  the  whole  length  of  the  New  Willard  big 
dining-room.  Those  who  were  to  speak,  and  other  extra- 
prominent  people,  were  sitting  at  that  table.  The  other 
tables  ran  into  the  speakers'  table  at  right  angles,  making 
the  famous  Gridiron.  President  Roosevelt  sat  to  the 
right  of  the  president  of  the  club,  Vice-President  Fair- 
banks sat  to  the  left  of  the  president  of  the  club.  Some 
foreign  minister  sat  next  to  Vice-President  Fairbanks. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  445 

J.  Pierpont  Morgan  sat  next  to  the  foreign  minister.  I 
sat  second  from  this  long  table  at  the  first  table  on  the 
left  of  the  president  of  the  club.  Melville  E.  Stone,  presi- 
dent of  the  Associated  Press,  sat  in  between  me  and  the 
long  table.  Dick  Lindsay,  of  The  Kansas  City  Star,  whose 
guest  I  was  particularly,  sat  next  to  me,  all  of  which 
putting  me  within  ten  or  fifteen  feet  of  President  Roose- 
velt. Senator  Foraker  sat  at  the  foot  of  the  first  table 
on  the  right  of  the  president  of  the  club,  so  when  he  swung 
out  in  the  aisle  to  make  his  speech  he  faced  President 
Roosevelt  directly — at  the  distance  of  perhaps  one  hun- 
dred and  fifty  feet. 

In  due  course  President  Roosevelt  was  called  on  for  a 
speech.  He  spoke  for  about  thirty  minutes  with  the 
utmost  vigor  about  railroad-rate  regulation,  concerning 
which  he  was  at  loggerheads  with  Senator  Foraker.  In 
a  general  way  he  spoke  about  reform  legislation,  and  he 
did  not  mince  matters. 

In  the  midst  of  this  speech  he  turned  around,  shook  his 
fist  in  the  general  direction  of  J.  Pierpont  Morgan,  H.  H. 
Rogers,  and  other  railroad  and  financial  magnates,  and 
in  the  tersest  language  possible  he  told  them  that  they  had 
better  join  in  with  him  and  carry  out  the  reasonable  re- 
form measures  which  he  advocated,  asserting  that  if  they 
did  not  aid  him  in  rational  reforms  they  would  fall  into 
the  hands  of  the  mob,  which  would  do  all  sorts  of  things 
to  them. 

After  he  was  through  talking  on  that  string,  he  opened 
up  on  the  Brownsville  quarrel,  and  made  some  direct 
references  to  Senator  Foraker,  and  undertook  to  justify 
himself  in  the  most  vigorous  fashion  for  what  he  had  done 
touching  the  Brownsville  colored  troops,  stating  that  he 
had  done  what  was  right  and  what  he  conceived  to  be 
his  duty,  and  that  he  would  brook  no  interference  from 
anybody  in  the  discharge  of  his  duties.  Of  course,  the 
situation  was  very  tens^,    f;verybody  knew  t;hat  h^  was 


446   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

shooting  at  Foraker,  as  Foraker  had  been  the  chief  oppo- 
nent to  the  Roosevelt  poHcy  in  that  matter.  Everybody 
knew  that  there  was  bad  blood  between  them,  and  had 
been  for  some  time,  and  many  were  wondering  whether 
Senator  Foraker  would  fight  back  or  not.  To  put  it 
mildly — very  mildly — excitement  ran  mountain-high.  As 
soon  as  President  Roosevelt  sat  down  the  president  of 
the  club,  Samuel  G.  Blythe,  arose  and  said:  "Now  is  the 
time  for  bloody  sarcasm.  I  introduce  Senator  Foraker 
of  Ohio."  Had  Mr.  Chairman  Blythe  been  all  the  major 
prophets  rolled  into  one,  he  could  not  have  hit  the  bull's- 
eye  nearer  the  center. 

Foraker  was  a  very  handsome  man,  over  six  feet  in 
stature,  weighing  slightly  over  two  hundred  pounds,  with 
as  fine  a  shock  of  iron-gray  hair  as  was  ever  on  a  man's 
head.  When  he  arose  to  address  the  club  his  face  was  as 
white  as  a  sheet.  Evidently  he  was  mad  through  and 
through.  In  five  minutes  after  he  began  his  speech  his 
face  was  as  red  as  the  stripes  on  the  flag.  He  should  have 
had  his  picture  taken  that  night  when  he  was  making 
that  speech.  If  he  had  done  so  he  would  have  come 
down  to  posterity  as  James  Steerforth  wished  to  be  re- 
membered— "at  his  best."  He  did  not  dodge  at  all.  He 
gave  blow  for  blow,  and  behind  his  blows  he  put  all  the 
steam  of  which  he  was  possessed.  He  endeavored,  in  the 
plainest  language  possible,  to  justify  his  opposition  to 
Roosevelt's  railroad-rate  bill,  and  all  of  his  other  reform 
measures  that  he  had  opposed.  He  finally  got  on  to  the 
Brownsville  business,  and  vigorously  defended  the  troops 
and  himself.  He  denounced  the  President's  conduct  as 
illegal,  unconstitutional,  and  unjustifiable.  After  ex- 
pressing the  great  love  he  once  had  for  the  President,  and 
telling  how  he  helped  him  get  the  nomination,  he  recited 
how  he  had  been  ignored  in  his  recommendations  for  ap- 
pointment, and  shouted:  "This  is  the  only  place  I  am 
on  the  same  plane  with  the  President,    If  I  go  to  the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  447 

White  House  he  has  the  drop  on  me;  if  I  make  a  speech 
about  him  in  the  Senate  he  cannot  answer  it;  but  I  wish 
it  distinctly  understood  that  I  am  free  born,  white,  over 
thirty  years  of  age,  and  the  people  of  Ohio  have  honored 
me  many  times  with  high  positions  and  sent  me  to  the 
Senate  twice.  I  did  not  come  to  the  Senate  to  take  orders 
from  anybody,  either  at  this  end  of  the  line  or  the  other. 
Whenever  I  fall  so  low  that  I  cannot  express  my  opinion 
on  a  great  question  freely,  and  without  reservation  or 
mental  evasion,  I  will  resign  and  leave  my  place  to  some 
man  who  has  the  courage  to  discharge  his  duties/'  This 
is  a  very  brief  outHne  of  what  Senator  Foraker  said.  He 
spoke  about  twenty  minutes,  as  nearly  as  I  can  recollect. 

While  Foraker  was  speaking  President  Roosevelt  was 
gritting  his  teeth,  clenching  his  fist,  shaking  his  head,  and 
muttering:  "That  is  not  so;  I  am  going  to  answer  that; 
that  is  not  true;  I  will  not  stand  for  it,''  and  similar 
remarks.  Three  or  four  times  he  started  to  get  up  to 
interrupt  Senator  Foraker,  and  Mr.  Justice  Harlan  and 
other  more  or  less  ancient  personages  kept  him  from 
interrupting  Foraker. 

The  very  minute  that  Senator  Foraker  sat  down  the 
President  jumped  up  like  a  "jack-out-of-the-box,"  and 
without  waiting  for  anybody  to  introduce  him,  began  his 
reply  to  Senator  Foraker.  It  was  red-hot.  He  dehvered 
his  blows  without  any  gloves  on.  He  was  intensely  bitter 
and  very  much  excited.  In  reviewing  the  Brownsville 
episode,  he  said  something  like  this:  "Some  of  those  men 
were  bloody  butchers;  they  ought  to  be  hung.  The  only 
reason  that  I  didn't  have  them  hung  was  because  I 
couldn't  find  out  which  ones  of  them  did  the  shooting. 
None  of  the  battahon  would  testify  against  them,  and  I 
ordered  the  whole  battahon  discharged  without  honor. 
It  is  my  business  and  the  business  of  nobody  else.  It  is 
not  the  business  of  the  Congress.  It  is  not  the  business 
of  the  House.     It  is  not  the  business  of  the  Senate.     All 


448  MY  QUARTER,  CENTURY  OF 

the  talk  on  that  subject  is  academic.  If  they  pass  a 
resolution  to  reinstate  these  men,  I  will  veto  it;  if  they 
pass  it  over  my  veto,  I  will  pay  no  attention  to  it.  I 
welcome  impeachment!"  It  is  hardly  over-stating  the 
case  to  say  that  he  took  the  breath  of  that  great  audience 
away — they  fairly  gasped. 

As  President  Roosevelt  concluded  Mr.  Speaker  Cannon 
was  introduced.  Usually  he  was  one  of  the  most  popular 
speakers  at  a  Gridiron  dinner;  but  so  great  was  the  ex- 
citement that  not  a  soul  paid  the  slightest  attention  to 
what  he  said,  except  myself,  and  I  was  listening  to  see 
what  he  was  going  to  say  about  the  tariff.  There  was  a 
universal  buzz  all  about  the  room.  President  Blythe, 
seeing  the  situation,  adjourned  the  club  immediately. 
The  guests  rushed  out  two  or  three  in  company,  and  in 
the  elevator  and  down  in  the  lobby  they  were  all  discuss- 
ing the  thing  sotto  voce. 

While  Uncle  Joe  was  making  his  speech,  I  turned  to 
Melville  E.  Stone  and  Dick  Lindsay  and  said  that  I  could 
tell  them  how  to  pull  off  the  greatest  sensation  since  Presi- 
dent McKinley  was  shot.  I  told  them  to  send  out  a  ver- 
batim copy  of  the  debate  of  President  Roosevelt  and 
Senator  Foraker,  notwithstanding  the  standing  rule  of 
the  club.  They  hooted  at  the  idea,  and  said  that  if 
any  one  had  surreptitiously  taken  a  stenographic  report 
of  the  debate  no  reputable  paper  would  publish  it.  Never- 
theless and  notwithstanding  the  thing  leaked  out.  The 
Washington  Post  said  that  that  was  too  important  a  matter 
to  be  hushed  up  by  any  rule  of  the  club's  etiquette. 

One  strange  and  interesting  result  growing  out  of  the 
excitement  created  by  that  debate  was  that  we  lost  half 
the  dinner,  beginning  with  the  hot  birds.  Usually  when 
I  go  to  a  banquet  I  cannot  sleep  very  well,  but  that  night 
I  went  home  and  slept  like  a  top.  Next  morning,  before 
I  got  up,  I  fell  to  reasoning  about  how  I  came  to  sleep  so 
well.     I  first  remembered  that  we  didn't  have  any  coffee. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  449 

Then  I  kept  running  it  back  until  I  found  that  we  missed 
about  half  of  the  dinner.  What  happened  was  that  when 
Senator  Foraker  arose  to  address  the  banqueters  the  waiters 
started  in  with  the  hot  birds.  President  Blythe  shooed 
them  out  of  the  room.  When  the  President  started  in 
the  second  time  the  waiters  again  started  in  with  the 
hot  birds.  Blythe  shooed  them  out  again,  and  they  never 
poked  their  heads  inside  that  dining-room  that  night 
again.  I  think  I  am  entirely  correct  in  stating  that  that 
is  the  only  case  on  record  where  a  President  of  the  United 
States  had  a  debate  with  any  human  being  in  the  presence 
of  a  large  audience.  Finally,  it  should  be  stated  that 
President  Roosevelt  had  his  way — ^that  the  colored  bat- 
talion was  never  reinstated. 

Senator  Foraker  persisted  in  having  his  name  presented 
to  the  Republican  National  Convention  in  1908,  but  re- 
ceived only  a  handful  of  votes — sixteen,  my  recollection 
is;  three  of  them  from  Ohio.  He  states  in  his  book  that 
he  knew  that  he  had  no  show  to  be  nominated;  that  the 
reason  he  was  a  candidate  was  he  hoped  that  among 
them  they  could  muster  enough  votes  to  nominate  some 
man  like  Senator  Fairbanks  over  President  Taft. 

Lord  Melbourne  said:  **I  wish  I  felt  as  cocksure  about 
any  one  thing  as  Tom  Macaulay  is  about  everything." 
Listening  to  Colonel  Roosevelt  or  reading  his  produc- 
tions, one  had  the  same  sort  of  feeling  as  to  him. 

He  died  at  the  early  age  of  sixty,  undoubtedly  the  fore- 
most private  citizen  of  the  world. 

Vol.  I.— 29 


CHAPTER  XVII 

Colonel  Roosevelt. 

PRESIDENT  ROOSEVELT  once  said:  "I  had  a 
corking  time  while  in  the  White  House,"  and  there 
is  no  doubt  that  he  did.  Perhaps  his  language  in  stating 
his  pleasure  therein  shocked  the  esthetes,  but  he  cared 
not  a  whit  for  that.  He  was  the  youngest  of  our  Presi- 
dents, being  only  forty-three  when  he  was  sworn  in  the 
first  time — young  enough  to  enjoy  life  and  power  to  the 
full;  and  he  was  not  at  all  squeamish  about  exercising  to 
the  limit  all  the  functions  and  prerogatives  devolved  upon 
his  high  office  by  the  Constitution  and  the  statutes — and 
then  some. 

There  was  as  tory  floating  around,  perhaps  apocry- 
phal, but  nevertheless  illustrative  of  what  the  people 
conceived  to  be  his  mental  attitude  toward  the  Con- 
stitution. He  was  telling  a  friend  of  his  anxiety  to  have 
a  certain  bill  passed,  and  his  surprise  that  Senators  op- 
posed it  because  they  deemed  it  unconstitutional.  His 
friend  replied  that  he  had  some  eminent  lawyers  in  his 
Cabinet  and  he  would  do  well  to  seek  their  opinion. 

"Oh,"  replied  the  President,  "I  have  done  that,  and 
the  strange  thing  about  it  is  that  they  all  say  it  is  uncon- 
stitutional!" 

The  truth  is  that,  not  being  a  lawyer,  he  had  only  what 
Governor  Dingley  would  have  denominated  ** surface  in- 
formation" touching  the  Constitution,  and  took  about 
the  same  view  of  it  as  did  President  Andrew  Jackson 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  451 

when  the  latter  exclaimed,  "John  Marshall  has  rendered 
his  opinion — now  let's  see  him  enforce  it!'* 

Frederick  the  Great  sometimes  kicked  the  shins  cf  his 
judges  to  force  them  to  render  decisions  agreeable  to  him. 
Jackson  and  Roosevelt  did  not  go  that  far,  but  they  re- 
served to  themselves  the  right  to  construe  the  Constitu- 
tion themselves. 

Having  read  all  of  Roosevelt's  writings,  according  to 
my  way  of  thinking  the  two  men  whom  he  admired  most 
were  Oliver  Cromwell  and  Andrew  Jackson.  He  sadly 
underestimated  Thomas  Jefferson,  James  Monroe,  John 
Tyler,  and  perhaps  others  of  his  predecessors;  but  he 
sincerely  admired  the  Iron  Soldier  of  the  Hermitage — as 
well  he  might,  for  he  was  well  worthy  of  the  love  and 
admiration  of  all  genuine  Americans.  I  always  imagined 
that  President  Roosevelt  deemed  himself  a  sort  of  com- 
bined Cromwell  and  Jackson.  The  only  really  heated 
argument  that  President  Roosevelt  and  I  ever  had  was 
about  Thomas  Jefferson,  he  assailing  and  I  defending 
the  author  of  the  immortal  Declaration. 

There  can  be  no  two  opinions  as  to  the  fact  that  Roose- 
velt was  one  of  the  most  extraordinary  characters  in  our 
history — extraordinary  being  the  word  which  most  fitly 
describes  him.  He  tried  his  hand  in  more  fields  of  human 
endeavor  than  did  any  other  of  our  Presidents — legislator, 
cowboy,  subordinate  civil  functionary,  soldier.  Governor, 
Vice-President,  President,  statesman,  author,  hunter,  ex- 
plorer, discoverer,  public  speaker — and  in  all  he  succeeded 
excellently  well;  in  some,  amazingly  well. 

He  defied  and  scouted  all  the  traditions  of  men  from 
Job  when  he  said,  "Oh,  that  my  adversary  had  written 
a  book!"  down  to  the  Articles  of  War.  The  Man  of  Uz 
evidently  believed  that  if  a  man  wrote  a  book  it  would 
rise  up  to  thwart  his  progress.  Roosevelt  wrote  several, 
and  expressed  in  them  his  opinions  as  to  men  and  things 
with  perfect  abandon — many  with  great  severity— but 


452   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

survived  them  all,  rising  to  the  giddiest  heights  of 
power. 

For  instance,  in  his  Life  of  Col,  Thomas  Hart  Benton,  he 
pronounced  this  opinion  on  Gen.  Robert  E.  Lee:  "The 
world  has  never  seen  better  soldiers  than  those  who  fol- 
lowed Lee,  and  their  leader  will  undoubtedly  rank  as  with- 
out any  exception  the  very  greatest  of  all  the  great  cap- 
tains that  the  English-speaking  peoples  have  brought 
forth;  and  this  although  the  last  and  chief  of  his  antag- 
onists may  himself  claim  to  stand  as  the  full  equal  of 
Marlborough  and  Wellington." 

That  is  not  only  one  of  the  finest  sentences  he  ever 
wrote,  considered  entirely  from  a  literary  standpoint,  but 
one  of  the  most  courageous,  considered  from  a  political 
point  of  view.  He  did  not  write  that  magnificent  char- 
acterization of  the  renowned  Virginian  because  his  own 
mother  was  a  Southerner — a  fact  of  which  he  was  justly 
proud.  It  cannot  be  accounted  for  by  reason  of  his 
fellow-feeling  for  a  soldier,  because  when  he  wrote  his 
Life  of  Benton  he  had  never  donned  a  uniform,  but  he 
blurted  itJ>ut  because  it  was  his  honest  opinion,  and  he 
proposed^for)the  world  to  know  it.  More  courage  was 
required  fernim — a  Republican  candidate  for  President 
from  his  youth  up — to  write  that  sentence  than  to  charge 
the  Spaniards  in  battle  array.  Many  other  men  held  the 
same  idea  and  voiced  it  in  their  own  fashion — sometimes 
to  help  themselves  politically.  But  while  Lee's  veterans, 
who  idolized  him,  together  with  their  descendants,  neigh- 
bors, and  friends,  were  highly  pleased  with  Roosevelt's 
lofty  and  finely  phrased  estimate  of  him,  they  could  not 
help  him  politically;  but  in  the  North,  where  Republi- 
cans most  abound,  the  woods  were  full  of  the  followers  of 
Grant  and  Sherman,  together  with  the  legions  of  descend- 
ants, neighbors,  and  friends,  who  could  easily  crush  the 
rising  and  all-absorbing  ambition  of  the  embryo  Repub- 
lican President,  provided  they  became  huffed  at  his  lauda^ 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  453 

tion  of  Lee,  for  it  must  be  remembered  that  it  was  years 
ago  that  he  wrote  of  the  illustrious  Confederate,  and  at  a 
time  when  the  passions  engendered  by  the  titanic  struggle 
between  the  states  were  still  at  white  heat. 

The  sentence  about  Lee,  in  its  complete  characteriza- 
tion, has  always  reminded  me  of  Jefferson's  opinion  of 
James  Monroe,  "Monroe  is  so  pure  that  you  might  turn 
his  soul  inside  out  and  not  find  a  blot  upon  it" — certainly 
a  sweeping  eulogy.  If  it  required  courage  for  Roosevelt 
to  write  this  of  Lee,  it  also  required  courage  for  him  to 
denominate  James  Monroe  as  "a  mediocre  President" — 
Monroe  immortal  as  the  author  of  the  Monroe  Doctrine, 
the  political  life-preserver  of  the  Western  World  and  the 
most  important  contribution  to  the  inchoate  Code  of 
International  Law — ^which  we  forced  into  that  code  by 
strong-arm  methods,  and  which  President  Roosevelt,  as 
President,  not  only  upheld,  but  considerably  expanded  by 
brandishing  his  "big  stick." 

There  has  been  so  much  written  and  spoken  about  him 
that  I  will  mention  only  a  few  of  his  deeds  which  seem 
to  me  out  of  the  ordinary.  The  wisest  poHtical  thing  he 
ever  did  for  himself,  in  my  judgment,  was  when,  coming 
into  the  Presidency  accidentally,  and  standing  by  McKin- 
ley's  coifin,  he  voluntarily  stated  that  he  would  pursue 
the  McKinley  policies,  which  he  did,  until  he  was  elected 
and  inaugurated  in  his  own  right.  He  even  went  so  far 
in  that  direction  as  to  appoint  certain  men  to  high  posi- 
tions for  the  reason  that  he  was  made  to  believe  that 
President  McKinley  wanted  them  appointed. 

Physically  he  was  as  active  as  a  cat,  always  in  perfect 
fettle,  and  he  thought  everybody  else — particularly  soldiers 
— should  be.  As  all  of  them  wished  to  stand  well  at  court, 
he  put  many  fat,  swivel-chair  warriors  through  stunts 
which  made  them  puff  and  blow  and  swear  like  Jack  Tars, 
but  they  were  careful  to  do  the  swearing  behind  his  back — 
very  far  behind  his  back — and  well  under  their  breath. 


454   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

When  he  issued  his  ukase  that  he  was  going  to  ride 
horseback  to  Winchester,  Virginia,  and  return — which  for 
him  was  only  a  holiday  performance — and  that  all  field 
officers  in  and  about  Washington  should  do  the  same, 
they  were  surprised,  amazed,  astounded,  dumfounded; 
but  they  were  afraid  to  refuse.  So  they  all  rode  to 
Winchester,  ninety  miles  away,  and  some  of  the  heftiest, 
who  hadn't  straddled  a  horse  for  thirty  or  forty  years, 
returned  to  the  finest  capital  in  the  world,  saddle-sore, 
muscle-sore,  heart-sore,  and  went  to  bed  for  a  week, 
using  up  so  much  arnica  that  the  local  supply  was  ex- 
hausted— ^while  the  world  wondered  and  guffawed,  the 
athletic  young  man  in  the  White  House  guffawing  loudest 
of  all. 

It  wasn't  so  wild  a  ride  as  Mazeppa's,  or  John  Gil- 
pin's, or  Paul  Revere's,  but  there  was  more  fun  in  it  for 
the  President  and  for  those  who  did  not  do  the  riding. 
No  doubt  the  Falstaffian  officers  deemed  him  crazy,  but 
there  was  method  in  his  madness.  It  was  a  broad  hint 
— very  broad— that  officers  entitled  to  ride  horses  should 
keep  themselves  fit  to  do  that  thing. 

Another  of  his  famous  equestrian  stunts  was  to  take 
Prince  Henry  of  Germany  on  a  long  ride  through  Rock 
Creek  Park  when  all  signs  indicated  a  heavy  downpour 
of  rain,  which  came  and  drenched  them  both  to  the  skin. 
What  His  Royal  and  Imperial  Highness  thought  of  that 
is  not  known — at  least  not  by  me. 

Notwithstanding  the  fact  that  President  Roosevelt 
liked  to  unload  the  burdens  of  state,  and  relieve  himself 
from  the  conversation  and  demands  of  big-bore  states- 
men and  insistent  pie-hunters,  by  consorting  even  in  the 
sacred  precincts  of  the  White  House  with  such  wild  and 
woolly  Westerners  as  Buffalo  Bill,  Bat  Masterson,  Ben 
Milam,  and  Buffalo  Jones,  a  habit  which  some  good  peo- 
ple, rolHng  their  eyes  toward  heaven,  condemned — he  was 
essentially   a   preacher,    and   delighted   in   sermonizing. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  455 

Most  of  his  speeches  and  many  of  his  messages  to  Con- 
gress were  what  may  not*  improperly  be  termed  lay- 
sermons.  His  critics  claimed  they  were  composed  of 
ancient  platitudes,  but  the  people  heard  him  gladly, 
and  he  went  on  his  way  bruskly,  vehemently,  and 
triumphantly. 

He  played  quarter-stafF  with  Gen.  Leonard  Wood — cer- 
tainly a  man's  game — boxed  with  pugilists,  played  tennis, 
and  otherwise  trained  his  muscles  and  his  legs  so  that  he 
kept  himself  in  the  pink  of  condition. 

It  is  told  in  Washington  that,  in  playing  at  quarter- 
stafF  with  General  Wood,  the  President  gave  him  such  a 
thwack  on  the  cranium  as  to  make  him  limp  slightly. 
Shortly  before  his  death.  Colonel  Roosevelt  stated  that 
in  a  pugilistic  bout  in  the  White  House  the  sight  of  one 
of  his  eyes  was  destroyed. 

He  was  a  law  unto  himself,  and  cared  little  for  the  pro- 
prieties, as  was  frequently  demonstrated — for  instance, 
when  he  humiliated  Gen.  Nelson  A.  Miles  by  a  severe 
reprimand  which  hundreds  of  thousands  of  Americans 
resented  as  brutal;  and  by  promoting  Gen.  Leonard 
Wood  and  Gen.  John  J.  Pershing  over  the  heads  of  many 
of  their  seniors,  to  the  disgust  of  nearly  all  the  officers 
in  the  army. 

He  almost  caused  the  elderly  politicians  and  statesmen 
to  have  apoplexy  when,  in  the  spring  of  1908,  he  stated 
bluntly:  "If  they  do  not  nominate  Taft,  they  will  have 
to  take  me" — and  in  order  to  escape  a  third  term  for  him 
they  nominated  Taft. 

Now  that  he  has  gone,  it  is  easy  to  say  kind  things 
about  him  and  to  laud  his  deeds.  In  the  last  half  of  his 
second  term,  when  he  was  engaged  in  batting  stand-pat 
Republicans  over  the  head  with  his  "big  stick,"  certain 
simple  Simons  among  Democrats  began  claiming  that  he 
was  a  Democrat,  which  was  all  pure  bosh.  I  grew  weary 
of  such  preposterous  talk  and  concluded  to  put  an  end  to 


456   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

it,  which  I  did  by  the  following  candid  remarks  in  the 
House — in  which  I  think  I  treated  him  fairly: 

"Mr.  Chairman,  within  the  last  few  days  we  have  been 
edified  by  a  series  of  somewhat  remarkable  speeches,  evi- 
dencing a  high  order  of  ability  in  our  membership,  on 
which  I  most  heartily  congratulate  the  country;  for  no 
man  more  rejoices  in  the  honor  and  glory  of  this  House 
than  I  do.  These  speeches  have  been  devoted  chiefly  to 
a  discussion  of  the  President's  message  and  of  the  Presi- 
dent himself. 

"Views  widely  divergent  as  the  poles  have  been  freely 
expressed  as  to  the  merits  and  demerits  of  this  extraor- 
dinary man,  one  of  the  most  extraordinary  in  American 
history.  In  this  case,  as  in  most  others,  the  line  of  safety, 
fairness,  and  justice  is  found  in  medias  res.  In  my  county 
there  was  a  lawyer  who  so  frequently  urged  courts 
and  juries  to  take  *a  reasonable  view'  that  his  saying 
passed  into  a  proverb.  That  is  exactly  what  should  be 
done  touching  the  President;  but  that  is  precisely  what 
has  not  been  done,  as  a  rule. 

"He  is  such  a  belligerent  personage  that  his  slightest 
word  is  a  challenge  to  mortal  combat,  and  he  cannot 
express  an  opinion  on  any  question  under  heaven,  even 
on  a  subject  so  prosaic  and  threadbare  as  the  prospective 
state  of  the  weather,  without  precipitating  a  row,  his 
extreme  admirers  declaring  that  there  never  has  been  such 
a  weather  prophet  on  earth  since  Adam  and  Eve  were 
driven  with  flaming  swords  from  Paradise;  and  his  ex- 
treme enemies  vociferating  that  he  knows  no  more  about 
the  weather  than  does  the  groundhog. 

"Upon  this  issue  there  would  be  joined  a  battle  royal, 
full  of  sound  and  fury,  signifying  nothing.  Colonel  Roose- 
velt laughs  to  scorn  the  words  of  the  great  Cardinal: 

**Love  thyself  last;  cherish  those  hearts  that  hate  theej 
Still  in  thy  right  hand  carry  gentle  peace 
To  silence  enyjou?  tongues, 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  457 

"On  the  contrary,  he  acts  on  the  theory  of  the  bellicose 
Irishman  who  said,  'When  you  see  a  head,  hit  it/  He 
has  whacked  so  many  heads  that  divers  reactionary  lead- 
ers are  in  the  political  hospital  for  repairs. 

"Still  others  of  them  perambulate  the  earth  with  poul- 
tices and  plasters  adorning  their  craniums. 

"His  whole  public  hfe  has  been  one  long  succession  of 
spectacular  fights.  No  man  was  ever  more  viciously  as- 
sailed by  men  of  his  own  party,  and  none  was  ever,  while 
still  in  the  flesh,  so  lavishly  lauded  by  some  of  the  opposing 
party. 

"But  the  truth  is  that  this  extraordinary  man  has 
waxed  stronger  and  stronger  by  waging  battle.  Even 
defeat  has  made  him  a  larger  and  more  commanding 
figure.  Never  in  his  mihtant  career  was  he  more  savage- 
ly abused  or  more  extravagantly  praised  than  at  the 
present  juncture. 

"So,  amid  the  swirl  of  things,  the  deluge  of  words,  the 
shoutings  of  the  captains,  the  beating  of  tom-toms,  the 
groans  of  crippled  and  wounded  Republicans,  the  furious 
yells  of  friend  and  foe,  one  who  is  the  personal  friend  of 
Theodore  Roosevelt,  the  man;  who  is  the  opponent  of 
Theodore  Roosevelt,  the  politician  or  the  statesman, 
as  the  case  may  be;  and  who  desires  to  take  a  'rea- 
sonable view'  of  the  sayings  and  doings  of  Theodore 
Roosevelt,  the  Chief  Magistrate  of  a  mighty  people — 
perhaps  has  little  chance  to  be  heard  in  this  babel  of 
voices. 

"But  I  will  have  my  say,  and  here  it  is:  Personally,  I 
like  him.  He  has  treated  me  well  and  I  have  tried  to 
treat  him  well.  After  the  manner  of  strong  men,  he  has 
pronounced  virtues,  and  glaring  faults  of  character.  I 
have  never  abused  him.  I  have  never  grown  hysterical 
in  admiration  of  him.  When  he  is  right  I  support  him 
cordially.  When  he  is  wrong  I  fight  him  tooth  and  nail. 
This  line  of  conduct  I  have  pursued  steadfastly  in  the 


458   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

past,  and  I  shall  adhere  to  it  without  shadow  of  turning 
even  unto  the  end.  It  seems  to  me  that  that  is  the  way 
in  which  he  would  desire  to  be  treated.  He  must  enter- 
tain ineffable  contempt  for  the  invertebrate  sycophants 
who  grovel  before  him  on  all  occasions,  and  who,  no  mat- 
ter what  he  says  or  what  he  does,  throw  high  their  sweaty 
caps  in  air,  shouting,  *Io!    Triumphe!     lo!    Triumphe!' 

"It  is  said  that  'a  king  can  have  no  friends,'  and  it 
seems  that  a  President  of  the  United  States — any  Presi- 
dent— is  in  the 'same  unhappy  situation.  It  is  claimed 
that  Colonel  Roosevelt  is  better  than  his  party — this  he 
could  easily  be  without  running  any  imminent  risk  of 
being  translated,  after  the  fashion  of  Elijah,  in  a  chariot 
of  fire  by  reason  of  his  goodness. 

"But,  whatever  his  virtues,  whatever  his  faults,  what- 
ever else  he  may  be,  he  is  not  a  Democrat;  for  Democracy 
means  the  least  amount  of  government  the  people  can 
get  along  with  consistent  with  the  fullest  enjoyment 
of  their  rights  to  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  hap- 
piness, while  Republicanism  means  the  greatest  amount 
of  government  that  the  people  will  stand,  and  he  of 
all  men  is  the  apostle  of  the  maximum  quantity  of 
government. 

"Occasionally,  very  much  to  the  delight  of  Democrats 
and  the  utter  confusion  of  Repubhcans,  he  appropriates 
or  absorbs,  borrows  or  seizes,  a  Democratic  idea,  and 
from  his  high  coign  of  vantage  advocates  it  with  tremen- 
dous force;  for  he  obeys  to  the  letter  at  least  one  Script- 
ural injunction,  *  Whatsoever  thy  hand  findeth  to  do, 
do  it  with  thy  might';  and  it  is  the  heavy  hand  of  Theo- 
dore Roosevelt  or  his  *big  stick'  which  has  driven  so 
many  Republicans  pell-mell  into  the  cave  of  Adullam, 
where  there  is  weeping  and  waiHng  and  gnashing  of  teeth 
and  much  profane  swearing. 

"So  far  as  he  has  advocated  Democratic  ideas,  so  far 
as  he  has  mauled  wicked  Republicans  with  his  mailed 


/         AMERICAN    POLITICS  459 

fist  or  has  thumped  them  with  his  *big  stick/  he  deserves 
the  unstinted  praise  and  gratitude  of  all  lovers  of  our 
country. 

** Twice  in  this  speech  I  have  applied  to  him  the  word 
'extraordinary/  which  seems  to  me  the  adjective  best 
fitting  his  character  and  his  endowments.  Whether  he 
is  a  great  man  I  do  not  know.  You,  Mr.  Chairman,  do 
not  know.  Nobody  knows.  There  is  an  old  saying, 
'Count  no  man  happy  till  he  is  dead.'  It  is  a  wise  and 
sane  rule  to  acclaim  no  man  great  until  he  is  in  his  grave. 
We  have  not  the  perspective  necessary  to  fix  his  status 
in  history,  and  it  is  sheer  folly  to  attempt  it. 

"Lord  Bacon,  the  most  philosophic  of  mankind,  with 
clear  vision  and  deep  pathos  expressed  the  same  idea  in 
his  last  will  and  testament  when  he  said:  'For  my  name 
and  memory,  I  leave  it  to  men's  charitable  speeches,  and 
to  foreign  nations,  and  to  the  next  age.'  His  proud  con- 
fidence was  not  misplaced,  for  bis  fame  has  augmented 
from  the  day  of  his  death  down  to  the  present  hour. 

"Individually,  I  wish  the  President  well  in  the  White 
House  till  March  4,  1909,  when  I  hope  he  will  quit  it 
forever.  I  congratulate  him,  from  the  bottom  of  my 
heart,  on  turning  a  deaf  ear  to  those  unwise  or  selfish 
friends  who  have  endeavored  to  persuade  him  to  violate 
the  wholesome  precedents  of  one  hundred  and  eleven 
years;  for  no  President  will  ever  be  elected  to  a  third \ 
term  until  the  Republic  is  on  its  last  legs.  After  he  leaves 
that  historic  mansion,  the  goal  of  so  many  ambitious 
hearts,  the  tomb  of  so  many  ardent  hopes,  I  wish  him 
happiness,  prosperity,  and  length  of  days. 

"We  can  all  be  honest  even  if  we  cannot  be  great,  and 
if  you  Republican  bigwigs  were  perfectly  candid  you 
would  confess  that  you  are  not  nearly  so  much  enamoured 
of  the  President  as  you  appear  to  be.  You  grow  red  in 
the  face,  thereby  inviting  vertigo  or  apoplexy  in  exalting 
him  to  the  skies;   for  he  is  still  the  dispenser-in-chief  of 


46o   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

pie;  and  a  Republican  statesman  bereft  of  pie  is  a  spec- 
tacle to  make  the  angels  weep.  When  I  see  you  trying 
to  apotheosize  him  by  mere  lip  service,  it  seems  to  me 
'Theiady  doth  protest  too  much/ 

"When  a  lad  I  had  a  classmate  who  pronounced  the 
Latin  word  vulgus,  which  means  'the  common  people/ 
'voolgoose/  By  reason  of  some  peculiarity  in  his  vocal 
apparatus  it  sounded  Hke  'bullgoose/  So  the  boys  fell 
into  the  habit,  as  a  joke,  of  pronouncing  it  *bullgoose/ 
It  is  the  'common  people'  among  the  Republicans,  the 
vulgus  of  the  Romans,  the  'bullgoose'  of  the  college 
boys,  that  constitute  Theodore  Roosevelt's  shield  and 
buckler  among  the  Republicans.  No  man  has  a  livelier 
comprehension  of  that  fact  than  Republican  Representa- 
tives. 

"I  have  heard  that  in  the  last  campaign  sundry  Re- 
publican Representatives  sought  and  obtained  from  the 
President  certificates  of  good  character  to  help  them  pull 
through.  We  all  know  that  when  the  Republican  man- 
agers came  to  the  conclusion  that  the  result  was  doubtful 
he  wrote  that  famous  letter  to  'My  dear  Mr.  Watson,< 
which  was  used  as  a  blanket  certificate  of  good  character 
for  all  RepubHcan  Members  of  Congress,  except  the  un- 
fortunate Mr.  Wadsworth.  But  even  his  epistle  to  Mr. 
Watson  could  not  prevent  the  Republican  majority  in 
the  House  from  falHng  from  one  hundred  and  fourteen  to 
fifty-five.  When  'Uncle  Joe'  read  the  returns  he  must 
have  been  in  the  frame  of  mind  of  Pyrrhus,  King  of 
Epirus,  when,  surveying  a  hard-won  field,  he  exclaimed: 
'Another  such  victory  and  we  are  undone.'" 

In  commenting  on  my  speech  The  Washington  Post  cas- 
ually remarked:  "Champ  Clark's  speech  must  have  been 
read  at  the  White  House  with  contending  emotions." 

I  am  inclined  to  think  that  in  that  speech,  while  he  was 
at  the  height  of  his  career,  my  description  of  him  was  as 
true  as  was  ever  drawn. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  461 

He  sent  so  many  messages  to  Congress,  of  a  didactic 
and  critical  nature,  that  toward  the  last  the  House  re- 
ceived the  announcement  by  his  messenger  of  **A  mes- 
sage from  the  President  in  writing"  with  roars  of  laughter. 
Finally  he  sent  in  one  so  offensive  in  its  reference  to 
certain  members  that  the  House  refused  to  receive  it. 

When  he  was  inaugurated  March  4,  1905,  I  saw  him 
do  a  characteristic  thing.  It  was  a  fine  day,  clear,  but  a 
little  too  cool,  with  a  stiff  north  wind  blowing.  Of  course 
there  was  an  immense  crowd.  Several  hundred  officials 
— including  Cabinet  members,  diplomats,  both  Houses  of 
Congress,  army  and  navy  officers,  and  other  more  or  less 
prominent  people — ^were  sitting  on  backless  benches,  ris- 
ing tier  on  tier  from  the  street  to  the  great  bronze  doors 
of  the  east  front  of  the  Capitol.  The  stand  from  which 
the  President  spoke  was  jammed  up  against  the  street, 
and  he  was  to  face  the  benchers. 

Across  the  street,  and  separated  from  it  by  a  cable  rope, 
facing  him,  were  perhaps  twenty  thousand  people  of  all 
conditions  in  life,  standing  up.  Shortly  after  Colonel 
Roosevelt  began  the  cable  rope  broke  from  the  weight  of 
the  multitude  behind  it — or,  what  is  far  more  probable, 
somebody  cut  it — and  here  came  the  crowd  like  a  wave 
of  the  sea,  right  up  close  to  the  President.  He  continued 
his  speech  to  the  benchers,  most  of  whom  had  been  hear- 
ing speeches  all  their  lives  and  who  consequently  did  not 
applaud  much. 

He  turned  to  hoi  polloi  and  shouted  one  sentence,  and 
they  made  the  welkin  ring  by  such  yells  that  it  must 
have  made  the  man  in  the  moon  curious  to  know  what 
was  happening  on  this  mundane  sphere. 

After  that  episode  he  spoke  mostly  to  the  howling, 
enthusiastic  multitude,  and  paid  little  attention  to  the 
more  or  less  listless  benchers. 

In  any  fair  estimate  of  this  extraordinary  man  it  should 
be  stated  th^t  his  own  life  w^s  clean  and  he  never  ceased 


\ 


462   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

from  trying  to  induce  others  to  lead  such  a  Hfe.     He  was 
[chief  among  the  moral  upHfters  of  his  day.     Men  who 
J  did  not  like  or  indorse  his  eternal  uplift  sermons  de- 
nounced him  as  the  chief  of  muckrakers. 

He  was  an  apostle  of  conservation  of  our  natural  re- 
sources, and  preached  it  constantly.  I  am  fully  per- 
suaded, however,  that  the  two  things  on  which  his  fame 
will  rest  in  the  coming  time  were  settling  the  Russo- 
\  Japanese  War,  for  which  he  was  voted  the  Nobel  Peace 
Prize  of  forty  thousand  dollars,  and  the  building  of  the 
Panama  Canal.  He  did  not  originate  that  Canal  project, 
but  he  seized  it  with  resolute  hand  and  forced  it  to  a  con- 
clusion. The  idea  of  an  Isthmian  canal  had  been  in  the 
minds  of  men  ever  since  Balboa  had  gazed  with  pleasure 
and  amazement  upon  the  Peaceful  Ocean.  Roosevelt  was 
severely  criticized  for  what  was  called  his  high-handed 
proceedings  in  creating  the  Panama  Republic,  and  even 
his  best  friends  must  admit  that  his  conduct  in  that 
matter  was  precipitate  and  contrary  to  the  rules  in 
such  cases  made  and  provided.  But  he  achieved  his 
desire — the  Canal  which  will  remain  as  his  monument 
till  time  shall  be  no  more — and  it  is  one  of  the  world's 
greatest  benefactions. 

One  of  the  most  pleasing  features  of  his  character  was 
a  sense  of  gratitude,  as  the  following  incident  will  show. 
When  the  forty-thousand-dollar  Nobel  Peace  Prize  was 
given  to  him  he  turned  it  over  to  the  government,  to  be 
disposed  of  in  ways  suggested  by  him.  But  when  we 
entered  the  World  War  nothing  had  been  done  by  Con- 
gress toward  carrying  out  his  views,  so  he  asked  that  the 
fund  be  returned  to  him  that  he  himself  might  distribute 
it  in  war  charities. 

Mr.  Gallivan  of  Massachusetts,  who  had  charge  of  the 
resolution,  came  to  me  and  asked  me  to  recognize  him, 
out  of  order,  to  call  it  up — ^which  I  cheerfully  and  promptly 
did.     When  Colonel  Roosevelt  parceled  out  the  money 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  463 

he  sent  Gallivan  and  myself  five  hundred  dollars  each,  to 
promote  war  charities  in  our  districts — a  gracious  and 
grateful  acknowledgment  of  our  aid  and  comfort.  There 
are  ten  counties  in  my  district,  and  I  gave  fifty  dollars 
to  the  Red  Cross  in  each  county. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

Hay  and  Roosevelt. 

AFTER  the  close  of  the  Spanish  War,  in  a  blaze  of 
-^  glory,  and  after  President  McKinley  had  elected 
the  next  House  of  Representatives  by  his  "swing  around 
the  circle,"  thereby  insuring  his  absolute  supremacy  for 
two  years  more,  and  his  unanimous  renomination  in  1900, 
he  settled  down  to  as  much  enjoyment  as  the  head  of  a 
mighty  nation  is  permitted  to  have.  His  powerful  friend, 
Senator  Hanna,  was  still  chairman  of  the  National  Com- 
mittee, with  one  eye  looking  to  the  re-election  of  President 
McKinley  and  with  the  other  looking  to  his  own  nomina- 
tion and  election  to  the  Presidency  in  1904.  Of  course, 
to  his  own  accession  to  the  White  House,  the  re-election 
of  his  protege  was  a  sine  qua  non;  and  the  Senator  had 
sense  enough  to  clearly  realize  that  fact,  and  in  his  double 
capacity  as  Senator  and  chairman  of  the  National  Com- 
mittee he  knew  that  he,  with  the  backing  of  the  adminis- 
tration, could  put  the  snuffers  on  the  presidential  hopes 
of  certain  ambitious  Senators;  but  he  reckoned  without 
his  host,  never  dreaming  that  the  young  Colonel  of  the 
Rough  Riders,  elected  Governor  of  New  York  in  1898, 
would  be  in  his  way  in  1904.  As  the  war  ended  in  triumph 
people  soon  forgot  that  the  firm  of  McKinley  and  Hanna 
were  very  much  opposed  to  it.  McKinley  was  posed  by 
his  enthusiastic  admirers  as  a  "Great  War  President," 
and  he  monopoHzed  the  glory  thereof,  except  what  Dewey, 
Schley,  Sampson,  Colonel  Roosevelt,  Gen.  Joe  Wheeler, 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  465 

Gen.  Fitzhugh  Lee,  and  Capt.  Richmond  Pearson  Hobson 
managed  to  appropriate. 

It  is  barely  possible  that  the  reason  why  both  McKin- 
ley  and  Hanna  were  so  bitterly  opposed  to  the  nomination 
of  Roosevelt  for  Vice-President  in  1900  was  that  they 
had  some  sort  of  presentiment  that  he  had  his  optic  fixed 
on  the  presidential  nomination  for  himself  in  1904,  and 
that  if  he  chose  so  to  do,  he  would  run,  Hanna  and  the 
National  Committee  together  with  the  administration  to 
the  contrary  notwithstanding.  Senator  Thomas  C.  Piatt, 
who  was  not  fond  of  Colonel  Roosevelt,  and  who  regarded 
him  as  an  enfant  terribky  and  did  not  want  him  to  have 
anything  to  do  with  the  control  of  patronage  in  New  York, 
thereby  poaching  on  his  preserves,  desired  to  get  rid  of 
him  by  "shelving  him"  in  the  Vice-Presidency;  but  he 
could  not  budge  Hanna  from  his  opposition  until  Senator 
Matthew  Stanley  Quay  came  to  his  rescue.  Quay  turned 
the  trick  by  letting  it  leak  out  that  unless  Hanna  would 
agree  to  Roosevelt's  nomination  he  would  insist  on  the 
convention  reducing  the  representation  from  the  Southern 
states  in  Repubhcan  national  conventions,  thereby  pull- 
ing the  foundations  from  under  Hanna's  castles  in  Spain. 
Shortly  the  news  of  Quay's  program  was  carried  to  Hanna, 
and  immediately  thereafter,  under  compulsion,  he  gave 
in  his  adhesion  to  the  boom  for  Roosevelt.  The  Machia- 
velli  from  Pennsylvania  won.  He  had  made  a  Vice- 
President  intentionally  and  a  President  "unbeknownst" 
to  himself. 

As  John  Hay,  Secretary  of  State  under  McKinley,  sub- 
sequently became  very  much  enamoured  of  Colonel  Roose- 
velt, who  as  President  retained  him  as  his  Premier,  it  will 
haply  add  to  the  gaiety  of  nations  to  insert  the  following 
somewhat  caustic  and  scholarly  letter,  written  by  Hay 
confidentially  to  his  friend  Henry  White  on  June  15,  1900, 
while  Colonel  Roosevelt  was  merely  Governor  of  New 
York,  and  when  Hay  never  dreamed  that  in  less  than  a 

Vol.  I.— 30 


466   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

week  he  would  be  nominated  for  Vice-President,  and  that 
in  Httle  more  than  a  year  he  would  be  serving  in  the 
Cabinet  of  President  Theodore  Roosevelt. 

"Teddy  has  been  here;  have  you  heard  of  it?  It  was 
more  fun  than  a  goat.  He  came  down  with  a  somber 
resolution  thrown  on  his  strenuous  brow  to  let  McKinley 
and  Hanna  know  once  for  all  that  he  would  not  be  Vice- 
President,  and  found,  to  his  stupefaction,  that  nobody  in 
Washington  except  Piatt  had  ever  dreamed  of  such  a 
thing.  He  did  not  even  have  a  chance  to  launch  his 
nolo  episcopari  at  the  major.  That  statesman  said  he 
did  not  want  him  on  the  ticket — that  he  would  be  far 
more  valuable  in  New  York — and  Root  said,  with  his 
frank  and  murderous  smile,  *0f  course  not;  you're 
not  fit  for  it.'  And  so  he  went  back  quite  eased 
in  his  mind,  but  considerably  bruised  in  his  amour 
propre." 

In  precisely  six  days,  before  Henry  White,  who  was  in 
London,  could  have  received  the  foregoing  letter,  but  after 
Piatt  and  Quay  had  pulled  off  their  grand  coup  and  had 
forced  Roosevelt's  nomination  for  Vice-President,  a  sud- 
den and  marvelous  ** change  came  o'er  the  dream"  of 
Mr.  Secretary  Hay,  and  he  changed  his  tune  to  the  extent 
of  writing  this  affectionate  epistle  to  Colonel  Roosevelt, 
June  21,  1900: 

My  Dear  Governor, — ^As  it  is  all  over  but  the  shouting,  I  take  a 
moment  of  this  cool  morning  of  the  longest  day  in  the  year  to  offer 
you  my  cordial  congratulations.  The  week  has  been  a  racking  one 
to  you.  But  I  have  no  doubt  the  future  will  make  amends.  You 
have  received  the  greatest  compliment  the  country  could  pay  you, 
and  although  it  was  not  precisely  what  you  and  your  friends  desire, 
I  have  no  doubt  it  is  all  for  the  best.  Nothing  can  keep  you  from 
doing  good  work  wherever  you  are — nor  from  getting  lots  of  fun  out 
of  it. 

We  Washingtonians,  of  course,  have  our  own  little  point  of  view. 
You  can't  lose  us;  and  we  shall  be  uncommonly  glad  to  see  you  here 
again. 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  467 

The  most  notable  sentence  in  that  letter  is,  "You  can't 
lose  us" — ^which  was  literally  true  in  Hay's  case,  as  he 
was  continued  by  Roosevelt  in  the  high  position  of  Sec- 
retary of  State.  It  is  interesting,  but  bootless,  to  phi- 
losophize as  to  what  Roosevelt  would  have  done  to  him 
had  he  seen  that  letter  to  Henry  White  before  he  became 
President. 

After  President  McKinley's  death  the  two  Houses  of 
Congress  concluded  to  memorialize  him  in  joint  session, 
and  Secretary  Hay  was  unanimously  chosen  by  the  com- 
mittee on  arrangements,  of  which  I  was  a  member,  to 
deliver  the  eulogy,  which  he  did  in  a  masterly  way;  but 
he  injected  into  it  a  strong  RepubHcan  stump  speech. 
During  its  delivery  I  was  sitting  next  to  Representative 
William  H.  Moody,  of  Massachusetts,  subsequently  Sec- 
retary of  the  Navy,  Attorney-General,  and  a  justice  of 
the  Supreme  Court — as  stanch  a  Republican  as  there  was 
in  the  country.  I  was  much  surprised  that  Mr.  Hay  in- 
jected partizan  politics  into  his  eulogy,  and  so  was  Mr. 
Moody.  When  Hay  began  on  steel  rails,  Mr.  Moody 
turned  to  me  and  said,  **That  is  rather  raw!" 

Subsequently,  when  the  committee  met  and  proposed 
a  resolution  thanking  Mr.  Hay  for  his  speech,  I  antago- 
nized it  on  the  ground  that  by  injecting  partizan  politics 
into  his  eulogy  he  had  grossly  violated  the  proprieties  of 
the  occasion.  Nevertheless,  the  committee  reported  the 
resolution  to  the  House,  and  when  it  was  considered  I 
spoke  as  follows: 

"When  Mr.  Hay  rose  to  deliver  his  address  he  had  such 
an  audience  as  only  two  other  men  in  the  entire  history 
of  the  government  ever  had — George  Bancroft,  when  he 
eulogized  Abraham  Lincoln,  and  James  G.  Blaine,  when 
he  pronounced  his  eulogium  upon  James  A.  Garfield — 
and  all  of  us  hope  that  a  similar  occasion  will  never  again 
arise — the  death  of  a  President  by  the  hand  of  an  assassin. 
For  the  purposes  of  the  orator,  Colonel  Hay  faced  the 


468   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

most  magnificent  audience  that  can  be  assembled  on  this 
continent — the  President  and  his  Cabinet,  the  Supreme 
Court  of  the  United  States,  the  Diplomatic  Corps,  a  prince 
of  the  German  Empire  and  his  suite,  both  Houses  of  Con- 
gress, the  head  of  the  army,  high  officers  of  the  navy, 
every  distinguished  man  in  official  and  unofficial  life  be- 
twixt the  two  oceans  that  could  be  crowded  into  this  his- 
toric hall,  together  with  much  of  the  beauty  of  the  land. 
It  was  such  an  audience  as  any  orator  would  be  fortunate 
to  address — such  an  audience  as  no  orator  now  living  will 
most  probably  address. 

"In  many  respects  I  entertain  a  nigh  opinion  and  a 
high  regard  for  the  Secretary  of  State.  He  is  a  most 
amiable  and  accompHshed  gentleman.  From  his  youth 
up  he  has  been  associated  with  intellectual  giants.  For 
four  years  he  was  brought  into  daily  contact  with  Abra- 
ham Lincoln,  which  in  itself  was  a  liberal  education. 
Colonel  Hay  is  himself  a  great  historic  personage.  He 
has  achieved  eminence  in  two  difficult  fields  of  human 
endeavor — in  literature  and  in  diplomacy.  He  has  been 
ambassador  to  the  Court  of  St.  James's,  and  is  now  Secre- 
tary of  State.  In  literature  he  has  performed  the  unusual 
feat  of  winning  fame  in  both  poetry  and  prose,  such  fame 
as  any  man  in  the  House  or  Senate  or  in  the  whole  country 
might  envy.  His  Life  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  or  Abraham 
Lincoln;  A  History,  as  it  is  entitled,  is  one  of  the  standard 
historic  works  of  the  world;  but  in  my  judgment  Mr. 
Hay's  literary  reputation  will  rest  more  on  his  Pike  County 
ballads  than  upon  anything  else  he  has  written.  Of  their 
class  they  are  about  as  good  as  anything  else  in  the  Eng- 
lish language.  As  an  earnest  of  what  he  might  have 
done  in  poetry,  they  lead  one  to  regret  that  their  author 
deserted  the  muses  for  the  stormy  world  of  politics. 

"Colonel  Hay  is  a  seasoned  hand  at  literature.  His 
address  was  carefully  wrought  out  in  his  library.  What 
he  said  was  not  uttered  in  the  *heat  of  debate'  or  on  the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  469 

spur  of  the  moment.  Consequently  he  cannot  complain 
if  he  is  held  strictly  to  the  highest  standard  of  good 
taste. 

"Not  only  did  he  have  a  distinguished  and  brilliant 
audience,  but  he  had  an  audience  entirely  sympathetic 
in  its  character.  I  undertake  to  say,  without  the  fear  of 
successful  contradiction,  that  there  was  not  a  man  or 
woman  within  these  walls  that  day,  not  a  man  or  woman 
in  his  greater  audience — the  entire  American  people — 
who  would  have  objected  to  any  word  of  eulogy  he  could 
have  pronounced  on  WilHam  McKinley,  however  extrava- 
gant, for  McKinley  was  a  popular  favorite — popular  with 
all  citizens,  all  classes,  and  all  parties,  in  a  most  extraor- 
dinary degree. 

"The  objection  I  make  to  thanking  the  Secretary  of 
State  is  not  that  he  delivered  a  eulogy  upon  Mr.  McKin- 
ley— that  was  what  he  was  invited  to  do,  what  he  was 
expected  to  do,  what  we  all,  myself  included,  wanted 
him  to  do — but  because  with  that  unequaled  opportunity, 
with  that  magnificent  audience,  he  departed  from  the 
language  of  eulogy  and,  disregarding  the  proprieties,  in- 
jected into  his  memorial  address  a  high-class  Republican 
stump  speech. 

"King  Solomon  says:  *There  is  a  time  for  every  pur- 
pose under  heaven.'  Of  course  there  is  a  time  for  Re- 
publican speeches.  I  do  not  object  to  Republican 
speeches  at  the  proper  time.  Strange  as  it  may  seem,  I 
rather  enjoy  hearing  a  good  Republican  stump  speech, 
although  I  doubt  exceedingly  if  any  RepubHcan  in  these 
later  days  can  make  a  stump  speech  without  committing 
blasphemy.  If  the  gentleman  from  Ohio,  General  Gros- 
venor,  for  instance,  will  make  a  Republican  speech,  I  will 
hear  him  gladly.  If  my  distinguished  friend  from  Indiana, 
Mr.  Landis,  will  do  it,  I  will  be  delighted  to  hear  him.  If 
divers  men  on  that  side  of  the  chamber  would  rise  and 
make  Republican  speeches  in  this  House,  I  would  listen 


470   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY^  OF 

with  pleasure.  I  have  heard  my  friend  from  Pittsburg, 
the  Hon.  John  Dalzell,  make  RepubHcan  speeches  on  dry 
economic  subjects  in  this  House  which  came  near  being 
epic  poems  in  their  character. 

*'But  I  will  never  be  willing  to  thank  any  man  any- 
where at  any  time  or  in  any  place  for  making  a  Republi- 
can speech.  That  is  what  we  are  asked  to  do  in  this 
resolution.  I  want  to  say  this  to  the  members  of  the 
House,  because  it  ought  to  be  said — that  as  a  literary 
performance  Colonel  Hay's  address  will  take  high  rank. 
There  are  some  phrases  in  that  oration  that  are  of  ex- 
traordinary excellence  and  almost  entitle  him  to  the 
dubious  honor  of  being  placed  in  the  same  class  with 
Grover  Cleveland  as  a  phrase-maker. 

**I  have  no  objection  to  the  literary  character  of  it,  but 
I  am  wilHng  to  submit  it  to  as  good  a  critic  of  political 
speeches  as  the  gentleman  from  Ohio  himself  (General 
Grosvenor),  or  the  gentleman  from  Massachusetts  (Mr. 
McCall),  or  as  the  gentleman  from  Illinois  (Mr.  Hitt), 
or  any  other  man  on  that  side  of  the  chamber  who  has 
literary  taste,  and  let  him  pronounce  if  Mr.  Hay  did 
not  violate  the  proprieties  of  the  occasion  when  he  in- 
jected into  that  eulogy  upon  President  McKinley  a 
Republican  stump  speech. 

"He  knew  himself  he  was  violating  the  proprieties,  be- 
cause he  states — I  cannot  quote  the  language  exactly; 
I  have  not  time  to  hunt  it  up — that  he  craves  the  indul- 
gence of  those  that  are  hearing  him,  if  perchance  he  injects 
into  the  speech  remarks  that  ought  not  to  have  been  made. 
Then  he  proceeded  to  make  a  stump  speech.  For  in- 
stance, he  stated  in  one  place  that  the  very  month  in 
which  Mr.  McKinley  was  inaugurated  steel  rails  sold  for 
eighteen  dollars  a  ton.  I  would  like  very  much  for  some 
man  to  state  as  a  literary  proposition  whether,  according 
to  the  canons  of  taste  and  to  preserve  tjie  unities  of  a 
great  historical  oration,  the  fact  that  steel  rails  sold  at 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  471 

eighteen  dollars  a  ton  in  the  month  of  March,  1897,  had 
anything  to  do  with  the  character  of  William  McKinley 
or  with  the  feeling  of  kindness  and  pride  which  the  Amer- 
ican people  entertain  for  him. 

"As  a  matter  of  fact,  if  steel  rails  sold  for  eighteen  dol- 
lars a  ton  in  the  month  of  March,  1897,  William  McKinley 
had  nothing  to  do  with  it,  because  he  had  not  been  in 
Congress  since  the  fourth  day  of  March,  1891.  No  Re- 
publican had  been  in  office  in  a  high  executive  place  for 
four  years  in  that  month,  and  if  steel  rails  sold  for  eighteen 
dollars  a  ton  at  that  time,  and  as  it  was  an  unprecedented 
thing  in  the  history  of  the  country,  then  the  credit  ought 
to  have  been  given  where  credit  is  due — ^to  the  Democrats 
of  this  country — instead  of  trying  to  filch  it  for  the  Repub- 
lican party.  But,  from  the  sentence  that  opens  up  with 
that  declaration,  until  near  the  close  of  the  address,  it 
was  as  fine  a  Republican  stump  speech  as  has  been  deliv- 
ered on  the  American  continent  within  the  last  two  years. 
Again,  he  states  that  because  Mr.  McKinley  was  a  patriot 
at  the  beginning  of  the  Civil  War,  he  was  necessarily  a 
Republican,  thereby  broadly  intimating  that  nobody  but 
a  Republican  can  be  a  patriot,  which  is  an  insult  to  one- 
half  the  citizens  of  the  Republic. 

"I  will  tell  you  what  will  happen,  and  I  know  it  just 
as  well  as  that  I  am  living:  If  you  pass  this  resolution, 
every  Republican  candidate  for  Congress  in  the  United 
States  will  not  only  circulate  this  speech  as  the  strongest 
possible  Republican  campaign  document,  but  at  the  same 
time  he  will  circulate  the  resolution  of  Congress  thanking 
him  for  delivering  it. 

"When  I  objected  to  the  unanimous  report  of  the  com- 
mittee, my  friend  from  New  Jersey  (Mr.  Parker)  rose 
and  asked  me  to  withdraw  it,  and  I  would  not  do  it.  I 
asked  for  three  days  to  consider  the  matter  whether  I 
would  make  a  minority  report,  and  within  the  three  days 
I  read  Mr.  Blaine's  speech  delivered  over  James  A.  Gar- 


472   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

field,  as  critically  and  as  carefully  as  any  speech  was  ever 
read  on  the  American  continent. 

"The  difference  in  situation  was  that  Blaine  delivered 
his  speech  under  the  most  difficult  circumstances  that 
could  possibly  have  surrounded  a  human  being  called 
upon  to  speak  on  such  an  occasion.  Here  sat  the  Repub- 
lican party,  divided  into  two  bitter  and  warring  factions. 
He  had  to  avoid  saying  too  much  in  praise  of  Garfield, 
and  he  had  to  avoid  insulting  what  was  called  the  'Stal- 
wart* faction  of  the  RepubHcan  party.  Yet  any  Amer- 
ican citizen  could  take  Blaine's  speech  and  read  it  from 
beginning  to  end  without  feeling  that  any  impropriety 
had  been  committed.  It  is  a  magnificent  oration.  There 
is  not  a  solitary  syllable  in  it  that  would  offend  'feather- 
head'  Republicans,  as  they  were  then  called,  or  a  'Stal- 
wart' Republican,  or  a  Democrat  of  any  of  the  number- 
less varieties  of  that  party  which  there  are  in  this  country. 
Mr.  Blaine  observed  the  proprieties  and  spoke  in  perfect 
good  taste. 

"When  Mr.  Hay  arose  to  speak  he  had  no  difficulty  to 
confront  him.  He  had  simply  to  observe  the  rules  of 
good  taste — literary  taste — to  observe  the  canons  of  lit- 
erary criticism.  But  he  did  not  do  it.  So  far  as  I  am 
concerned,  if  there  is  not  another  man  in  this  House  who 
votes  against  thanking  him  for  it,  I  propose  to  so  vote. 

"I  want  to  repeat  that  I  am  not  hidebound  on  the 
subject  of  politics.  I  am  a  Democrat,  and  always  expect 
to  be  one.  Politics  has  absolutely  nothing  to  do  with 
my  opposition  to  this  resolution  of  thanks.  I  recognize 
that  every  man  has  the  right  to  his  political  opinions  and 
to  express  them  on  any  occasion  that  is  fitting  in  terms 
that  seem  to  him  right  and  proper.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
less  than  two  months  ago  I  sat  in  my  place  here  and  led 
the  applause  for  my  distinguished  friend  from  the  state 
of  Washington  (Mr.  Cushman)  when  he  was  delivering  a 
brilliant  Republican  speech;    and  I  perfpimied  the  very 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  473 

same  kindly  office  for  my  distinguished  friend  from  Michi- 
gan (Mr.  William  Alden  Smith)  when  he  delivered  his 
great  oration  on  the  Cuban  reciprocity  scheme.  But  I 
believe,  Mr.  Speaker  and  gentlemen,  that  the  House 
simply  sinks  its  own  dignity  when  it  votes  to  thank  a 
man  for  delivering  a  political  speech  (I  care  not  how 
classical  its  phrases)  when  he  ought  to  have  observed  all 
of  the  proprieties  of  the  occasion  which  he  not  only 
failed  to  observe,  but  which  he  violated  in  the  most 
flagrant  manner." 

Of  course  the  thing  happened  which  I  prophesied.  The 
whole  Republican  press — "Blanche,  Tray,  and  Sweet- 
heart"— barked  viciously  at  me,  aided  by  certain  so-called 
Democratic  papers,  always  with  keen  appetites  for  the 
crumbs  from  the  White  House  and  Cabinet  tables;  but  I 
survived  their  assaults  and  found  vindication  for  my 
position  and  my  speech  when,  in  1908,  Mr.  William  Ros- 
coe  Thayer  published  The  Life  and  Letters  of  John  Hay, 
for  on  page  381,  volume  ii,  he  makes  this  candid  and  re- 
freshing statement: 

"  For  pure  eulogy  which  makes  no  pretense  at  criticism, 
his  oration  on  President  McKinley  might  serve  as  a 
model — affectionate,  dignified,  imputing  only  the  best 
motives,  and  giving  full  credit  to  every  good  deed.  The 
laudation  of  the  Republican  party,  to  which  Hay  attributed 
almost  every  beneficent  act  in  fifty  years,  except  possibly 
the  introduction  of  antiseptic  surgery,  must  have  tickled 
Hay's  sense  of  humor  in  the  writing,  as  it  surely  fed  the 
satisfaction  of  the  thousands  who  heard  it.  Underneath 
the  exuberance  of  encomium  there  is  still  an  honest  outline 
of  the  services  of  the  partyJ*^ 

I  most  cheerfully  commend  that  paragraph  by  Mr. 
Thayer  as  a  thorough  vindication  of  my  opposition  to 
the  resolution  thanking  Mr.  Secretary  of  State  Hay  for 
injecting  a  Republican  stump  speech  into  the  belly  of  his 
eulogy. 


CHAPTER  XIX 

The  gold  plank  adopted  by  Republicans  in  1896. 

THERE  is  an  ancient  saw  familiar  to  the  ears  of  men 
that  "History  frequently  repeats  itself,"  and  most 
certainly  it  is  true.  I  have  already  related  how,  at  the 
Democratic  National  Convention  of  1892,  the  friends  of 
the  then  ex-President  Cleveland  cooked  up  an  elaborate 
"straddle"  on  the  tariff  question,  which  "straddle"  had 
the  support  of  Mr.  Cleveland  himself;  and  how  Tom 
Johnson  and  Larry  Neal — both  of  Ohio,  aided  and  abetted 
by  other  intense  souls — took  the  convention  away  from 
the  committee  on  platform  and  inserted  a  bold  and 
radical  plank — ^which  disgusted  Mr.  Cleveland  so  utterly 
that  he  asserted  that  that  plank  was  put  in  for  the  pur- 
pose of  defeating  him,  but  on  which  he  was  elected  over- 
whelmingly.       ^ 

So  to  the  National  Republican  Convention  of  1896 
Governor  McKinley  sent  a  draft  of  a  platform,  prepared 
by  himself  and  a  coterie  of  his  close  friends  and  advisers, 
the  financial  plank  of  which  was  an  ingenious  "straddle," 
designed  to  please  the  single  Gold  Standard  Republicans 
and  also  to  hold  the  Free  Silver  Republicans.  It  was  a 
lovely  scheme,  if  only  it  had  been  adopted  by  the  con- 
vention, which  it  was  not,  and  would  have  worked  well — 
but  it  did  not  work  at  all  and  was  scornfully  rejected. 
When  the  "straddle"  on  the  tariff  was  presented  to  the 
Democratic  Convention  of  1892  it  was  not  certain  that 
ex-President  Cleveland  would  be  nominated,  and,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  he  captured  the  necessary  two-thirds  of  the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  475 

delegates,  with  only  ten  and  one-third  to  spare.  Had  not 
the  Missouri  delegation  voted  under  the  unit  rule,  he 
would  have  been  defeated,  for  in  that  delegation  were 
fourteen  men  who  were  opposed  to  Mr.  Cleveland.  But 
when  Governor  McKinley  sent  his  "financial  straddle'* 
to  the  St.  Louis  convention  it  seemed  absolutely  certain 
that  he  held  the  nomination  in  the  hollow  of  his  hand; 
for  a  very  large  majority  of  the  delegates  were  instructed 
for  him;  but  the  out-and-out  Gold  Standard  men,  such  as 
Senator  Henry  Cabot  Lodge,  Senator  Thomas  C.  Piatt  and 
Edward  Lauterbach,  raised  such  a  rumpus  that  it  was 
freely  asserted  that  McKinley  would  lose  the  nomination 
unless  he  came  down  off  his  "straddle"  and  agreed  to  the 
out-and-out  Gold  Standard — ^which  he  did,  because  the 
strong  talk  of  beating  him  for  the  nomination  so  startled 
and  worried  his  manager,  Marcus  A.  Hanna,  that  he  noti- 
fied his  protege  to  agree.  It  was  a  fine  kettle  offish.  The 
consequence  was  that  McKinley  secured  the  nomination 
by  a  majority  of  661^  to  84^^  for  Thomas  Brackett  Reed, 
his  closest  opponent,  with  a  few  scattering  on  the  only 
ballot,  and  was  compelled  to  make  his  race  on  a  platform 
which  made  the  Gold  Standard  the  paramount  issue, 
instead  of  making  it  on  a  platform  of  his  own  devising, 
which  made  the  tariff  the  paramount  issue — ^though  in  his 
heart  the  tariff  was  his  first  love. 

All  this  is  decidedly  refreshing  when  McKinley's  record 
on  the  vexed  and  vexing  coinage  question  is  taken  into 
account.  Herbert  Croly,  Hanna's  biographer,  who  seems 
to  have  worshiped  Hanna  as  a  sort  of  fetish,  and  who 
does  not  hesitate  one  moment  to  minimize  anybody  in 
order  to  magnify  his  hero — not  even  sparing  McKinley — 
says  in  his  book  at  page  193:  "His  [McKinley's]  own 
record  in  relation  to  legislation  affecting  the  standard  of 
value  had  been  vacillating."  The  word  vacillating  is 
entirely  too  mild  and  polite.  Some  folks  called  it  "wab- 
bling," and  accused  him  of  turning  somersaults.     In  a 


476   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

measure  these  latter  were  justified  in  using  the  French 
phrase  ^'f  accuse.''  McKinley  had  made  some  very  strong 
speeches  in  favor  of  silver,  severely  arraigning  the  Demo- 
crats for  being  unfriendly  to  silver  coinage.  In  addition 
he  had,  while  in  the  House,  voted  for  the  Bland  Silver 
bill,  and  had  also  voted  to  pass  it  over  the  veto  of  Ruther- 
ford B.  Hayes,  an  Ohio  Republican  President — ^which 
seems  to  me  to  have  been  "going  the  whole  hog'*  as  a 
silver  man — to  use  a  phrase  common  in  the  West.  As 
these  transactions  have  grown  dim  in  human  memory, 
and  as  some  over-enthusiastic  worshiper  of  McKinley 
may,  without  exact  information,  rise  up  to  deny  that  his 
record  is  properly  set  forth  herein,  it  is  apropos  to  state 
that  his  vote  in  favor  of  the  Bland  Silver  bill  is  duly  re- 
corded at  page  241  of  The  Congressional  Record^  volume 
vi,  of  the  Forty-fifth  Congress,  first  session,  on  November 
5,  1877;  and  his  vote  in  favor  of  passing  the  Bland  Silver 
bill  over  Hayes's  veto  is  recorded  at  page  1418,  volume 
vii,  part  2,  of  The  Congressional  Record  for  the  Forty-fifth 
Congress,  on  February  28th,  in  the  year  of  our  Lord  and 
Master,  1878. 

Mr.  Croly  attempts  to  make  it  appear  that  Hanna  was, 
all  along,  really  and  secretly  in  favor  of  declaring  for  the 
Gold  Standard,  that  he  outwardly  deferred  to  McKinley's 
wishes  by  reason  of  his  wider  experience  in  politics,  that 
he  connived  at,  if  he  did  not  participate  in,  the  eflForts  of 
the  advocates  of  the  Gold  Standard  men  to  force  a  bald 
declaration  in  its  favor  into  the  platform,  and  that  he 
wanted  them  to  force  his  hand — ^which  they  very  oblig- 
ingly did.  And  in  this  way,  according  to  Croly,  Hanna 
played  it  on  McKinley — all  of  which  Croly  appears  to 
think  was  a  credit  to  Hanna.  Some  people  will  not  agree 
with  Mr.  Croly's  valuation  of  that  performance;  but,  as 
declaring  for  the  Gold  Standard  was  by  far  the  most 
important  thing  that  happened  at  that  convention,  Mr. 
Croly,  the  historian  of  Hanna  and  incidentally  of  McKin- 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  477 

ley,  should  be  heard  in  full  on  that  point.  Here  is  what  he 
says  in  his  book: 

"Undoubtedly  Mr.  McKinley  himself  wanted  to  sub- 
ordinate the  currency  issue  to  that  of  protectiofi.  His 
own  record  in  relation  to  legislation  affecting  the  standard 
of  value  had  been  vacillating.  He  was  a  bimetaUist,  and 
had  stood  for  the  use  of  both  gold  and  silver  in  the  cur- 
rency of  the  United  States  without  inquiring  too  closely 
whether  the  means  actually  used  to  force  silver  into  cir- 
culation had  or  had  not  tended  to  lower  the  standard  of 
value.  His  personal  political  prominence  had  been  due 
to  his  earnest  and  insistent  advocacy  of  the  doctrine  of 
high  protection,  and  he  feared  that  if  the  currency  issue 
were  sharply  defined  the  result  would  necessarily  be  (as 
it  was)  a  diminution  in  price  of  his  own  political  and  eco- 
nomic stock  in  trade.  Considerations  of  party  expe- 
diency reinforced  his  own  personal  predilections.  His 
party  was  united  on  the  issue  of  protection.  It  was 
divided  on  the  currency  issue.  There  were  Silver  Re- 
publicans, and  they  all  came  from  a  part  of  the  country 
in  which  he  was  personally  very  popular.  The  sentiment 
in  favor  of  a  single  Gold  Standard  was  strongest  in  New 
England  and  the  Middle  States,  which  were  more  or  less 
opposed  to  his  nomination.  If  he  had  favored  unequivo- 
cally a  single  Gold  Standard,  his  candidacy  would  have 
been  weakened  among  his  friends,  while  his  opponents 
would  have  merely  shifted  their  ground  of  attack.  Not 
unnaturally,  he  proposed  to  evade  the  issue,  by  standing 
for  'sound  money,'  without  defining  precisely  what  sound 
money  really  was. 

"Mark  Hanna's  personal  attitude  was  different  from 
that  of  Mr.  McKinley.  He  was  enough  of  a  banker  to 
realize  that  the  business  of  the  country  was  suffering  far 
more  from  uncertainty  about  the  standard  of  value  than 
it  was  from  foreign  competition.  Ex-Gov.  William  R. 
Merriam  tells  of  certain  interesting  conversations  which 


478   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

took  place  in  August,  1895,  on  the  porch  of  Mr.  Hanna's 
house,  overlooking  Lake  Erie,  between  himself,  Russell  A. 
Alger,  Mr.  Hanna,  and  Mr.  McKinley,  in  which  both  the 
political  and  economic  aspects  of  the  progressive  campaign 
issues  were  thoroughly  discussed.  In  these  conventions 
Mr.  McKinley  was,  in  Mr.  Merriam's  own  phrase,  'ob- 
sessed' with  the  idea  of  the  tariflP  as  the  dominant  issue 
of  the  coming  campaign.  Mr.  Hanna,  on  the  other  hand, 
was,  in  Mr.  Merriam's  words,  'in  favor  of  committing 
the  Repubhcan  party  to  gold,  as  the  sole  basis  of  currency, 
and  he  was  anxious  and  wiUing  to  lend  his  aid  to  the 
furtherance  of  this  policy.'  " 

Inasmuch  as  Mr.  McKinley  was  the  cJandidate,  his 
views  prevailed.  Throughout  the  whole  preliminary  can- 
vass the  currency  issue  was  evaded.  The  state  conven- 
tions, in  which  the  candidate's  personal  influence  pre- 
vailed, declared  for  sound  money  and  the  coinage  of  silver 
in  so  far  as  it  could  be  kept  on  a  parity  with  gold.  Con- 
ventions such  as  that  of  Wyoming  instructed  their  dele- 
gates for  McKinley,  while  declaring  at  the  same  time  for 
the  free  and  unlimited  coinage  of  silver.  Mr.  McKinley 's 
ambiguous  attitude  on  the  currency  was  helping  the  can- 
vass in  the  Western  states,  and  he  probably  desired  as 
much  as  McKinley  did  that  any  more  precise  definition 
of  the  issue  should  at  least  be  postponed  until  after 
Mr.  McKinley's  nomination  was  assured.  In  no  event 
would  he  have  insisted  upon  any  opinion  of  his  own  in 
respect  to  an  important  matter  of  public  policy  in  an- 
tagonism to  that  of  his  candidate  and  friend. 

McKinley's  opinion  remained  unchanged  until  the  very 
eve  of  the  convention.  Mr.  Kohlsaat  asserts  that  on 
Sunday,  June  7th,  he  spent  hours  trying  to  convince  Mr. 
McKinley  of  the  necessity  of  inserting  the  word  "gold" 
in  the  platform.  The  latter  argued  in  opposition  that 
90  per  cent,  of  his  mail  and  his  callers  were  against 
such  decisive  action,  and  he  asserted  emphatically  that 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  479 

thirty  days  after  the  convention  was  over  the  currency 
question  would  drop  out  of  sight  and  the  tariff  would 
become  the  sole  issue.  The  currency  plank,  tentatively 
drawn  by  Mr.  McKinley  and  his  immediate  advisers, 
embodied  his  resolution  to  keep  the  currency  issue  sub- 
ordinate and  vague.  According  to  Mr.  Foraker,  Mr. 
J.  K.  Richards  came  to  him  at  Cincinnati  some  days  before 
the  date  of  the  meeting  of  the  convention,  bringing  with 
him  direct  from  Canton  some  resolutions  in  regard  to 
the  money  and  the  tariff  questions  prepared  by  the 
friends  of  Mr.  McKinley  with  his  approval.  Mr.  Foraker 
had  been  slated  for  the  committee  on  resolutions,  and 
the  McKinley  draft  was  placed  in  his  hands  with  a  view 
to  having  them  incorporated  in  the  platform.  The 
currency  plank,  as  handed  to  Mr.  Foraker,  began  as 
follows : 

"The  Republican  party  is  unreservedly  for  sound 
money.  It  is  unalterably  opposed  to  every  effort  to  de- 
base our  currency  or  disturb  our  credit.  It  resumed 
specie  payments  in  1879,  and  since  then  it  has  made  and 
kept  every  dollar  as  good  as  gold.  This  it  will  continue 
to  do,  maintaining  all  the  money  of  the  United  States, 
whether  gold,  silver,  or  paper,  at  par  with  the  best  money 
of  the  world  and  up  to  the  standard  of  the  most  enlight- 
ened governments. 

"The  Republican  party  favors  the  use  of  silver  along 
with  gold  to  the  fullest  extent  consistent  with  the  main- 
tenance of  the  parity  of  the  two  metals.  It  would  wel- 
come bimetallism  based  upon  an  international  ratio,  but 
until  that  can  be  secured  it  is  the  plain  duty  of  the  United 
States  to  maintain  our  present  standard,  and  we  are  there- 
fore opposed,  under  existing  conditions,  to  the  free  and 
unlimited  coinage  of  silver  at  sixteen  to  one." 

The  resolutions  mentioned  by  Mr.  Foraker  were  placed 
in  his  hands  on  Monday  or  Tuesday,  June  8th  or  9th. 
Mr.   Foraker,  however,  did  not  reach   St.   Louis  until 


480   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Saturday  morning,  and  in  the  mean  time  a  good  deal  had 
been  happening  there  and  elsewhere  in  respect  to  the 
currency  plank.  Mr.  Hanna  had  already  gone  to  St. 
Louis.  When  he  arrived  he  had  in  his  possession  a  draft 
of  certain  resolutions,  presumably  the  same  which  had 
been  taken  to  Mr.  Foraker  by  Mr.  J.  K.  Richards.  He 
was  joined  in  St.  Louis  early  in  the  week  by  a  number  of 
Mr.  McKinley's  friends  and  supporters,  and  in  the  group 
a  lively  discussion  almost  immediately  arose  as  to  the 
precise  wording  which  should  be  adopted  in  defining  the 
currency  policy  of  the  RepubHcan  party.  This  group 
consisted  in  the  beginning  of  Senator  Redfield  Proctor, 
of  Vermont,  Col.  Myron  T.  Herrick,  General  Osborne,  and 
Mr.  Hanna  himself.  Mr.  Hanna  was  so  busy  in  rounding 
up  his  delegates  and  in  attending  to  other  details  that  he 
could  not  give  much  of  his  time  to  the  conferences  over 
the  platform,  but  he  was  in  and  out  and  knew  what  was 
going  on. 

Toward  the  middle  of  the  week  the  group  of  gentlemen 
participating  in  these  conferences  was  increased  by  sev- 
eral accessions  from  the  number  of  Mr.  McKinley's 
friends  in  other  states,  among  whom  may  be  mentioned 
Mr.  Henry  C.  Payne,  WiUiam  R.  Merriam,  and  Melville 
E.  Stone.  After  his  arrival,  Mr.  Henry  C.  Payne  became 
particularly  active  in  getting  the  conference  together  and  in 
having  copies  supphed  to  each  participant.  On  Wednes- 
day morning  Mr.  Hanna  handed  to  Mr.  Payne  the  draft 
of  the  currency  plank  as  prepared  by  McKinley,  with 
the  request  that  it  be  revised  by  the  conference  and 
put  into  final  shape.  The  discussion  continued  on  Thurs- 
day. After  an  agreement  had  been  reached  on  certain 
changes,  Mr.  Payne  was  asked  to  prepare  another  draft 
for  discussion  on  the  following  day,  which  was  Friday. 

On  Friday  morning  Mr.  H.  H.  Kohlsaat,  of  Chicago, 
joined  the  conference,  having  come  over  from  Chicago  in 
response  to  a  telegram  particularly  for  that  purpose.     Mr, 


AMERICAN   POLITICS  4S1 

Kohlsaat's  relation  to  the  whole  matter  was  peculiar. 
He  was  a  friend  of  long  standing,  both  of  Mr.  McKinley 
and  Mr.  Hanna.  He  had,  of  course,  been  favorable  to 
the  former's  nomination,  but  in  the  newspapers  which  he 
controlled  he  had  combined  an  earnest  advocacy  of  Mr. 
McKinley's  selection  with  an  even  moree  arnest  and  in- 
sistent advocacy  of  the  single  Gold  Standard.  He  states 
that  he  had  not  been  allowed  by  Mr.  McKinley  and 
by  Mr.  Hanna  to  assist  in  the  contest  for  the  delegation 
from  Illinois,  because  they  were  embarrassed  by  his  atti- 
tude on  the  currency  question.  With  the  addition  of 
Mr.  Kohlsaat  the  members  of  the  conference  consisted  of 
Mr.  Payne,  Colonel  Herrick,  Senator  Proctor,  ex-Governor 
Merriam,  and  Mr.  Stone.  Mr.  Hanna  was  present  a 
certain  part  of  the  time,  but  he  had  so  many  other  matters 
which  required  his  attention  that  he  was  frequently  being 
called  off. 

There  is  some  conflict  of  testimony  as  to  the  proceedings 
of  the  conference  on  Friday.  Colonel  Herrick  states  that 
the  final  draft  had  been  substantially  submitted  and  ac- 
cepted on  Friday  morning.  Mr.  Kohlsaat,  on  the  other 
hand,  declares  that  in  the  draft  forming  the  basis  of  dis- 
cussion at  the  beginning  of  the  conference  the  word  "gold" 
was  omitted.     This  draft  read  as  follows: 

"The  Republican  party  is  unreservedly  for  sound 
money.  It  caused  the  enactment  of  the  law  providing 
for  the  resumption  of  specie  payments  in  1879.  Since 
then  every  dollar  has  been  as  good  as  gold.  We  are  un- 
alterably opposed  to  every  measure  calculated  to  debase 
our  currency  or  impair  the  credit  of  our  country.  We 
are  therefore  opposed  to  the  free  and  unlimited  coinage 
of  silver,  except  by  agreement  with  the  leading  commer- 
cial nations  of  Europe,  and  until  such  agreement  can  be 
obtained  we  beheve  that  the  existing  Gold  Standard  should 
be  preserved.  We  favor  the  use  of  silver  as  currency,  but 
to  the  extent  only  that  its  parity  with  gold  can  be  main- 

VoL.  I.— 31 


482   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

tained,  and  we  favor  all  measures  designed  to  maintain 
inviolably  the  money  of  the  United  States,  whether  coin 
or  paper,  at  the  present  standard,  the  standard  of  the 
most  enhghtened  nations  of  the  earth." 

The  foregoing  draft  was  furnished  by  Colonel  Herrick. 
It  differs  in  one  or  two  minor  respects  from  the  draft 
which,  according  to  Mr.  Kohlsaat,  formed  the  basis  for 
discussion  at  the  conference  of  Friday.  The  minor  dif- 
ferences are  merely  matters  of  order,  and  may  be  ignored. 
The  essential  difference  turns  upon  the  insertion  of  the 
word  "gold"  before  "standard."  According  to  Mr.  Her- 
rick, the  draft  prepared  by  Mr.  Payne  contained  the  word 
"gold."  According  to  Mr.  Kohlsaat,  the  decision  to  in- 
sert that  word  was  reached  only  after  a  protracted  dis- 
cussion and  a  sharp  controversy  between  himself  and  Mr. 
Hanna.  Not  until  four  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  after 
Mr.  Hanna  had  withdrawn,  was  an  agreement  obtained. 
In  view  of  the  unanimity  of  his  friends  Mr.  Hanna  gave 
his  consent  and  agreed  to  urge  its  acceptance  on  Mr. 
McKinley.  It  was  Colonel  Herrick  who  telegraphed  to 
the  candidate  and  obtained  his  approval.  According  to 
the  testimony  of  Colonel  Herrick,  Mr.  Kohlsaat,  Mr. 
Merriam,  and  Senator  Proctor,  the  whole  matter  was 
settled,  so  far  as  Mr.  McKinley  and  his  friends  were  con- 
cerned, by  Friday  night. 

In  the  several  accounts  of  these  conferences,  the  one 
doubtful  point  is  whether  or  not  the  word  "gold"  was 
contained  in  the  draft  prepared  by  Mr.  Payne.  The 
matter  is  not  of  great  importance,  except  in  respect  to 
Mr.  Kohlsaat's  claim  that  he,  more  than  any  single 
individual,  was  responsible  for  its  insertion,  and  that 
he  was  called  a  "d — d  fool"  by  Mr.  Hanna  for  his 
pains.  The  only  available  account  from  Mr.  Hanna 
himself  of  his  own  relation  to  the  gold  plank  is  con- 
tained in  the  following  letter  to  A.  K.  McClure,  written 
on  June  28,  1900: 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  483 

My  Dear  Mr.  McClure, — I  am  in  receipt  of  yours  of  the  21st  inst., 
which  has  just  been  reached  in  my  accumulation  of  letters.  I  do  not 
care  to  have  go  into  print  all  that  I  told  you  personally  in  regard  to 
the  gold  plank  of  the  St.  Louis  platform.  When  I  went  to  St.  Louis 
I  took  with  me  a  memorandum  on  the  tariff  and  financial  questions 
drawn  by  Mr.  McKinley.  During  all  the  discussions  there  prior  to 
the  action  of  the  Committee  on  Resolutions  I  showed  it  to  a  few 
friends  and  had  it  rewritten  by  the  Hon.  J.  K.  Richards,  the  present 
U.  S.  Solicitor-General.  It  was  but  slightly  changed  by  those  who 
considered  it  before  it  went  to  the  Committee  and  as  presented  was 
passed  by  the  Committee  with  little  or  no  change.  My  part  of  the 
business  was  to  harmonize  all  sections  and  prevent  any  discussion  of 
the  subject  outside  the  Committee  which  would  line  up  any  factions 
against  it  (except  the  ultra-silver  men).  In  that  I  succeeded,  and  felt 
willing  to  give  all  the  credit  claimed  by  those  who  assisted.  The 
original  memorandum  is  in  the  possession  of  a  personal  friend,  whom 
I  do  not  care  to  name  without  his  consent.  The  whole  thing  was 
managed  in  order  to  succeed  in  getting  what  we  got,  and  that  was  my 
only  interest. 

Sincerely  yours, 

M.  A.  Hanna. 


The  foregoing  letter,  while  it  throws  no  light  upon  the 
time  and  occasion  of  the  insertion  of  the  decisive  word 
into  the  draft,  supplies  the  clue  which  enables  us  to  in- 
terpret Mr.  Hanna's  own  behavior,  both  during  these 
conferences  and  thereafter.  He  himself  was  in  favor  of 
the  Gold  Standard,  and  in  favor  of  a  declaration  to  that 
effect.  But  partly  because  of  his  loyalty  to  Mr.  McKin- 
ley and  partly  because  he  did  not  want  any  decisive  step 
taken  until  the  sentiment  of  the  delegates  had  been  dis- 
closed, he  preferred  to  have  his  hand  forced,  and  he  did 
not  want  to  have  it  forced  too  soon.  Although  a  decision, 
so  far  as  Mr.  McKinley  and  his  friends  were  concerned, 
had  been  reached  on  Friday,  public  announcement  of  the 
fact  was  scrupulously  avoided,  and  Mr.  Hanna  evidently 
proposed  to  avoid  it  as  long  as  he  could.  It  was  essential, 
considering  the  divergence  of  opinion  among  Mr.  McKin- 
ley's  supporters,  that  the  candidate's  official  representa- 


484   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

tive  should  not  assume  the  position  of  pubHcly  and  ex- 
plicitly asking  the  convention  to  adopt  the  Gold  Standard. 
Mr.  McKinley's  personal  popularity  would  suffer  much 
less  in  case  every  superficial  fact  pointed  to  the  conclusion 
that  the  Gold  Standard  was  being  forced  on  him  by  an 
irresistible  party  sentiment. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  such  was  the  case.  As  the  dele- 
gates gathered  in  St.  Louis,  the  friends  of  the  Gold 
Standard  learned  for  the  first  time  their  own  strength. 
Business  men  east  of  the  Mississippi  had  been  reaching 
the  conclusion  that  the  country  could  never  emerge  from 
the  existing  depression  until  a  Gold  Standard  of  value  was 
assured.  They  and  their  representatives  learned  at  St. 
Louis  that  this  opinion  had  become  almost  unanimous 
among  responsible  and  well-informed  men.  Mr.  Hanna 
received  numberless  telegrams  from  business  men  of  all 
degrees  of  importance,  insisting  upon  such  action.  The 
substantial  unanimity  of  this  sentiment  among  Republi- 
can leaders,  particularly  in  the  Middle  West,  clinched  the 
matter.  Mr.  McKinley  would  not  have  consented  to 
any  decisive  utterance  had  he  not  been  convinced  that 
the  great  majority  of  his  friends  and  his  party  were  un- 
alterably in  favor  of  it.  Every  one  of  the  participants  in 
the  preliminary  conferences  considered  it  desirable,  and 
their  united  recommendation  constituted  a  constraining 
force  which  Mr.  McKinley  could  not  ignore.  Such  being 
the  case,  any  controversy  as  to  the  precise  time  and  occa- 
sion of  the  insertion  of  the  word  "gold"  into  the  actual 
draft  becomes  of  small  importance.  It  would  have  been 
inserted,  anyway,  not  by  any  one  man,  or  by  the  repre- 
sentatives of  any  one  section,  but  because  the  influential 
members  of  the  party,  except  in  the  Far  West,  had  be- 
come united  on  the  subject.  Credit,  however,  particu- 
larly attaches  to  those  Middle-Western  politicians  and 
business  men  who  had  the  intelligence  to  understand  and 
the  courage  to  insist  that  the  day  for  equivocation  in 


AMERICAN   POLITICS  485 

relation  to  this  essential  Issue  had  passed,  and  who  per- 
suaded Mr.  McKinley  that  he  must  stand  on  a  gold  plat- 
form even  at  some  sacrifice  of  personal  prestige  and  per- 
haps at  some  risk  of  personal  success. 

If  Mr.  McKinley  had  failed  to  consent  to  the  Insertion 
of  the  word  "gold,"  and  had  prevailed  upon  all  his  inti- 
mate friends  to  assume  the  same  attitude,  he  might  pos- 
sibly have  prevented  his  own  nomination.  At  all  events, 
as  soon  as  Mr.  McKInley^s  opponents  arrived,  they 
immediately  began  an  attack  on  what  was  manifestly 
the  weak  point  In  the  McKinley  fortifications.  They 
knew  that  his  nomination  was  assured,  unless,  perchance, 
he  could  be  placed  in  opposition  to  the  will  of  the  conven- 
tion upon  some  Important  matter,  and  of  course  they 
represented  a  part  of  the  country  in  which  public  opinion 
in  general  was  more  united  in  favor  of  the  Gold  Standard 
than  It  was  In  the  Ohio  and  Mississippi  valleys.  Senators 
Lodge  and  Piatt  reached  St.  Louis  on  Sunday.  They 
learned  of  the  controversy  over  the  currency  plank,  but 
not  about  the  decision  actually  reached.  Senator  Lodge 
went  immediately  to  the  McKinley  headquarters.  In  his 
ensuing  Interview  with  Mr.  Hanna  the  latter  gave  him 
no  encouragement  about  the  insertion  into  the  plank  of 
the  word  "gold."  Mr.  Lodge  and  ex-Governor  Draper 
were  shown  the  drafts  of  two  resolutions,  one  of  which 
was  understood  to  have  just  arrived  from  Canton,  and 
neither  of  which  committed  the  party  to  the  Gold  Stand- 
ard. Senator  Lodge  then  told  Mr.  Hanna  that  these 
drafts  were  unsatisfactory,  and  that  Massachusetts  would 
demand  a  vote  upon  any  similar  plank.  After  some 
further  talk  Mr.  Lodge  went  away,  but  he  served  notice 
on  Mr.  Hanna  that  efforts  would  be  made  to  consolidate 
the  sentiment  In  the  convention  opposed  to  any  "straddle." 
By  Monday  night  the  advocates  of  the  Gold  Standard 
had  a  majority  of  the  convention  rounded  up  in  favor  of 
an  unequivocal  declaration  in  its  favor. 


486   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

Of  course,  this  was  precisely  the  result  which  Mr.  Hanna 
wanted.  The  evidence  is  conclusive  that  on  Friday  night 
both  he  and  Mr.  McKinley  were  prepared  to  accept  a 
decisive  Gold  plank  (which  he  personally  had  always  ap- 
proved) but,  as  he  says  in  his  letter  to  Mr,  McClure,  his 
part  of  the  business  was  "to  prevent  any  discussion 
of  the  subject  outside  of  the  committee  on  resolutions 
which  would  line  up  any  factions  against  it."  That  is, 
he  proposed  to  leave  the  action  of  the  convention  on 
the  plank  uncertain  until  the  committee  on  resolutions 
could  launch  a  draft  which  would  have  the  great  majority 
of  the  convention  behind  it,  and  which  would  constrain 
the  doubters  and  the  trimmers.  By  failing  to  tell  Senator 
Lodge  that  a  draft  containing  the  word  *'gold"  had 
already  been  accepted  by  McKinley,  he  astutely  accom- 
plished his  part  of  the  business.  He  arranged  for  the 
consolidation  of  the  sentiment  in  favor  of  the  Gold  Stand- 
ard, while  he  prevented  any  consoHdation  of  the  sentiment 
against  it,  except  on  the  part  of  the  irreconcilables.  If 
he  had  announced  as  early  as  Saturday  or  Sunday  that  a 
declaration  in  favor  of  the  Gold  Standard  would  be  sup- 
ported by  Mr.  McKinley's  friends  and  probably  adopted 
by  the  convention,  a  considerable  number  of  half-hearted 
and  double-minded  delegates  might  have  been  won 
over  by  the  leaders  of  the  Silver  faction.  And  it  might 
have  seemed  like  a  desertion  by  McKinley  of  the  pro- 
Silver  delegates,  who  had  been  prevented  by  the  ambi- 
guity of  the  candidate's  previous  attitude  from  opposing 
him. 

The  text  of  the  plank,  as  it  came  from  the  committee 
and  appeared  in  the  platform,  read  as  follows : 

"The  Republican  party  is  unreservedly  for  sound 
money.  It  caused  the  enactment  of  a  law  providing  for 
the  resumption  of  specie  payments  in  1879.  Since  then 
every  dollar  has  been  as  good  as  gold.  We  are  unalter- 
ably opposed  to  every  measure  calculated  to  debase  our 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  487 

currency  or  impair  the  credit  of  our  country.  We  are 
therefore  opposed  to  the  free  coinage  of  silver,  except  by 
international  agreement  with  the  leading  commercial 
nations  of  the  earth,  which  agreement  we  pledge  our- 
selves to  promote;  and  until  such  agreement  can  be 
obtained  the  existing  Gold  Standard  must  be  maintained. 
All  of  our  silver  and  paper  currency  must  be  maintained 
at  parity  with  gold,  and  we  favor  all  measures  designed 
to  maintain  inviolably  the  obligations  of  the  United 
States,  and  all  our  money,  whether  coin  or  paper,  at  the 
present  standard,  the  standard  of  the  most  enlightened 
nations  of  the  earth.'*     Here  ends  Mr.  Croly. 

After  the  Gold  Standard  plank  was  inserted  in  the 
platform  there  were  more  men  who  claimed  credit  for 
that  momentous  achievement  than  there  were  cities 
vaunting  themselves  as  being  the  birthplace  of  Homer. 
The  two  who  boasted  loudest  were  Senator  Thomas  Col- 
lier Piatt,  of  New  York,  and  Senator  Joseph  Benson 
Foraker,  of  Ohio — ^whom  by  a  strange  lapsus  pennce 
Mr.  Croly  always  refers  to  as  Mr.  or  Senator  James  B. 
Foraker. 

Mr.  H.  H.  Kohlsaat  and  his  friends  tried  to  make  it 
appear  that  he  did  it,  for  doing  which  he  received  at  least 
two  savage  drubbings,  one  at  the  hands  of  Myron  T. 
Herrick,  subsequently  Governor  of  Ohio  and  ambassador 
to  France,  the  other  from  Senator  Foraker.  Croly  sneers 
at  the  pretensions  of  both  Piatt  and  Foraker  as  to  the 
authorship;  but  as  both  those  Senators  wrote  autobiog- 
raphies, it  is  best  to  let  them  speak  for  themselves.  Piatt 
says  in  part: 

**It  was  in  1896  that  I  scored  what  I  regard  as  the 
greatest  achievement  of  my  political  career.  That  was 
the  insertion  of  the  Gold  plank  in  the  St.  Louis  platform. 
Early  in  his  first  term  in  Congress,  William  McKinley, 
of  Ohio,  had  first  espoused  the  cause  of  bimetallism,  and 
then  all  but  declared  that  the  white  instead  of  the  yellow 


488   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

metal  should  be  the  standard  of  monetary  value.  Mark 
A.  Hanna,  who  had  assumed  the  management  of  the 
campaign  whose  ultimate  object  was  to  name  and  elect 
McKinley  successor  to  President  Cleveland,  sent  agents 
through  the  country  two  years  in  advance  of  the  national 
convention,  pledging  his  choice  to  gold  in  Gold  states,  and 
silver  in  Silver  states.  In  Wyoming,  for  instance,  the 
delegates  to  St.  Louis  were  instructed  to  support  McKin- 
ley and  use  all  honorable  means  to  secure  the  adoption 
of  a  platform  declaring  for  Free  Silver. 

"My  opposition  to  Governor  McKinley  proceeds  almost 
entirely  from  my  belief  that  his  nomination  would  bring 
the  Republican  party  into  turmoil  and  trouble.  He  is 
not  a  well-balanced  man  of  affairs.  Governor  McKinley 
is  not  a  great  man,  as  Mr.  Reed  (Thomas  B.)  is.  He  is 
not  a  trained  and  educated  public  man,  as  Senator  Allison 
is.  He  is  not  an  astute  political  leader,  as  Senator  Quay 
is.  He  is  simply  a  clever  gentleman,  much  too  amiable 
and  much  too  impressionable  to  be  safely  intrusted  with 
great  executive  office,  whose  desire  for  honor  happens  to 
have  the  accidental  advantage  of  the  association  of  his 
name  with  the  last  Republican  protective  tariff. 

"There  are  two  qualities — resolution  and  courage — 
which  the  people  always  require  in  their  Chief  Magistrate. 
McKinley  represents  the  most  radical  and  extreme  view 
of  protection.  I  foresee  the  greatest  dangers  to  the  Re- 
publican party  as  the  result  of  extreme  tariff  legislation. 

"Fully  as  important  as  the  tariff  bill — yes,  more  so — 
is  the  measure  that  must  be  devised  to  render  our  cur- 
rency system  intelligible,  safe,  and  elastic.  If  Major 
McKinley  has  any  real  convictions  on  the  subject  of  the 
currency,  they  are  not  revealed  in  his  votes  or  his 
speeches. 

"He  voted  once  for  free  and  unlimited  coinage  of  silver. 
He  voted  to  override  the  veto  of  President  Hayes  of  the 
Bland  bill,  and  at  times  h^  has  vot^d  in  direct  conflict 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  489 

with  these  votes.  He  has  described  himself  as  a  bimet- 
alHst;  as  in  favor  of  the  free  coinage  of  both  metals. 
His  Ohio  platform  proposes  another  experiment  in  silver 
coinage,  such  as  the  Bland-Allison  Act  or  the  Sherman 
law,  with  the  parity  between  the  metals  enforced  by 
legislation. 

"This  should  remove  McKinley  from  the  list  of  presi- 
dential possibilities.  The  people  of  this  country  have 
had  enough  of  the  attempts  to  force  fifty  cents'  worth  of 
silver  into  circulation  as  a  dollar.  They  have  suffered 
incalculable  losses  as  a  result  of  twenty  years  of  such 
politics. 

"I  doubt  if  I  can  better  relate  the  accurate  history  of 
the  struggle  over  the  Gold  plank  at  St.  Louis  than  by 
quoting  from  memoranda  prepared  by  Charles  W. 
Hackett,  chairman  of  the  New  York  Republican  State 
Committee,  1896.  He  was  in  the  thick  of  the  combat, 
and  was  invaluable  to  us  in  securing  the  victory  we 
achieved.  Hackett  drew  up  the  notes  before  his  death, 
as  an  answer  to  statements  of  certain  Republicans  hostile 
to  our  regular  organization,  who  sought  to  deprive  the 
New  York  and  New  England  delegations  of  the  credit  of 
placing  the  party  and  its  candidates  squarely  on  the  Gold 
Standard  platform. 

"Hackett  wrote: 

"  *So  far  as  the  credit  for  what  was  done  is  concerned, 
the  friends  of  Mr.  Piatt  and  Senator  Lodge  are  more  than 
satisfied  with  the  newspaper  reports  that  were  printed  at 
the  time.  They  told  who  did  it.  They  showed  the  essen- 
tial fact  that  Mr.  Hanna  and  those  who  were  working 
with  him  came  to  St.  Louis  with  a  "straddle."'" 

The  controversy  as  to  the  identity  of  the  author  of  the 
Gold  plank  waxed  bitter  and  personal.  Attempt  was 
made  to  give  credit  to  Herman  H.  Kohlsaat,  a  Chicago 
editor.  That  and  other  claims  so  infuriated  Senator 
Fpr^k^r  tb^t  he  wrote  ^  hot  ^nd  daborate  pamphlet  on 


490   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

"The  Gold  Plank,"  which  only  added  fuel  to  the  flames. 
I  here  copy  its  most  salient  features: 

"In  The  Metropolitan  for  September  is  an  article  written 
by  William  Eugene  Lewis,  in  which,  speaking  of  Mr.  H.  H. 
Kohlsaat,  it  is  stated  that: 

"*Mr.  Kohlsaat  drafted  the  gold  plank  of  the  Republi- 
can platform'  (of  1896).  .  .  .  *Mr.  Kohlsaat  perceived 
that  the  fight  would  be  on  finance,  and  nothing  could  be 
gained  by  evasion.  He  presented  the  resolution  to  the 
committee  and  insisted  upon  its  incorporation  in  the 
platform.  He  placed  strong  pohtical  friendships  in  peril, 
for  men  as  close  and  even  closer  to  the  candidate  than  he 
— if  any  more  intimate  relations  could  exist  than  those 
between  the  editor  and  the  candidate — ^were  emphatically 
of  the  opinion  that  it  was  the  part  of  unwisdom  to  declare 
for  gold  coinage.  They  were  overcome,  and  the  rest  is 
known.     The  editor  had  guessed  right.' 

"I  have  seen  substantially  this  same  statement  several 
times  repeated,  and  have  never  seen  any  denial  of  it. 
Mr.  Lewis  has  no  doubt  repeated  it  in  perfect  good  faith, 
believing,  and  in  the  absence  of  denial  he  had  a  right  to 
believe,  it  to  be  strictly  true.  Nevertheless,  it  is  untrue. 
Mr.  Kohlsaat  necessarily  knows  this,  and,  being  the  editor 
of  a  newspaper,  has  good  facilities  for  contradicting  it, 
but  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  he  has  not  done  so. 

"If  the  subject  is  worth  discussing  at  all,  in  the  interest 
of  true  history,  and  for  fear  Mr.  Kohlsaat  may  be  misled 
by  apparent  acquiescence  into  the  belief  that  nobody 
knows  any  better,  and  that,  after  all,  he  probably  did 
something  of  the  kind  narrated,  the  truth  should  be 
made  known  by  somebody. 

"I  had  opportunity  to  know  what  occurred  and  all  that 
occurred  before  or  in  connection  with  the  committee  on 
resolutions  of  the  Republican  National  Convention  of 
1896,  for  I  was  not  only  a  member  of  the  committee,  but 
I  was  chairman  of  both  the  committee  that  reported  the 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  491 

platform  and  the  sub-committee  that  framed  it.  I  was 
present  and  presided  at  all  the  meetings  of  both  the 
committee  and  sub-committee  when  the  platform  or  any 
part  of  it  was  under  consideration,  and  necessarily  knew 
everything  that  transpired.  Besides,  I  have  a  complete, 
stenographically  kept  record  of  all  that  occurred,  showing 
all  communications  to  the  committee  and  the  sub-com- 
mittee, and  showing  the  appearance  of  all  persons  who 
came  before  these  committees  or  either  of  them,  and  what 
they  appeared  for.  There  is  no  mention  of  Mr.  Kohlsaat 
in  the  record,  and  every  member  of  the  committee  who 
has  any  recollection  on  the  subject  knows  that  he  never 
appeared  before  the  committee  or  the  sub-committee  in 
any  connection  or  for  any  purpose  whatever.  More  than 
that,  so  far  as  I  can  now  recall,  his  name  was  never  men- 
tioned by  any  member  of  either  committee  in  connection 
with  the  platform  or  any  proposition  in  it.  There  were 
a  great  many  'financial  planks'  and  resolutions  on  the 
'money  question'  sent  to  the  committee  and  brought 
to  the  committee,  and  in  one  way  or  another  presented  to 
the  committee  for  consideration,  but  not  one  was  iden- 
tified in  any  way  whatever  with  Mr.  Kohlsaat  or  his 
name.  I  have  still  in  my  possession  every  such  resolution, 
all  properly  labeled,  but  none  of  them  bears  his  name  or 
any  indorsement  that  has  reference  to  him.  This  should 
be  enough  to  dispose  of  that  part  of  the  statement  which 
credits  Mr.  Kohlsaat  with  'presenting  the  resolution 
that  was  adopted  to  the  committee,  and  insisting  upon 
its  adoption.' 

"That  Mr.  Kohlsaat  favored  some  such  plank  as  was 
adopted  I  do  not  doubt,  but  if  so  he  was  but  in  har- 
mony with  90  per  cent,  of  the  leading  Republicans  of  the 
country  outside  of  the  so-called  Free  Silver  states;  and 
that  he  may  have  at  some  time,  or  in  some  manner,  or 
for  somebody  else's  benefit,  prepared  a  resolution  of  some 
kind,  is  probably  also  true.     It  would  have  been  strange 


492  MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

if  he  had  not,  for  the  preparation  of  financial  planks  for 
that  platform  was  very  commonly  indulged  in  shortly 
before,  and  about  the  time  of  the  convention  by  Republi- 
cans all  over  the  country.  Such  resolutions  were  then 
being  adopted  by  the  different  state  conventions;  they 
were  being  discussed  by  the  newspapers  and  the  people 
generally.  Not  only  those  who  took  an  active  part  in 
politics,  but  business  and  professional  men  who  had  no 
thought  of  attending  any  convention  were  giving  expres- 
sion to  their  ideas  and  striving  to  acceptably  formulate 
them.  The  great  number  of  these  resolutions  that  were 
sent  to  the  committee,  and  which  I  still  have  in  my  pos- 
session, show  all  this.  They  show  more  than  this.  They 
show  that  outside  of  the  Silver  states,  among  the  leading 
Republicans  of  the  country,  there  was  an  overwhelming 
sentiment  in  favor  of  an  unequivocal  declaration  in  favor 
of  maintaining  the  existing  Gold  Standard  and  opposing 
the  free  and  unlimited  coinage  of  silver.  Almost  every 
resolution  on  the  subject  that  came  to  the  committee 
was,  in  effect,  of  this  character,  though  many  of  them 
were  objectionable  because  of  their  prolixity  or  phrase- 
ology. 

"So  that  if  Mr.  Kohlsaat  had  prepared  such  a  resolution 
and  presented  it  to  the  committee,  he  would  have  been 
only  acting  in  harmony  with  the  leading  men  of  his  party 
all  over  the  country.  It  is  probable,  however,  that  he 
did  find  some  people  'close  to  the  candidate'  who  were 
disposed  to  be  more  conservative  with  respect  to  such  a 
declaration  than  the  Republicans  of  the  country  generally 
were,  and  it  is  possible  that  his  controversy  with  them 
was  such  as  to  strain  relations  and  'imperil  political 
friendships.'  If  so,  Mr.  Kohlsaat  should  be  allowed  full 
credit  for  what  he  may  have  done  in  this  regard,  but  to 
enable  us  to  judge  rightly  he  ought  to  tell  us  all  about  it. 

"To  recur  now  to  the  authorship  of  the  plank  that  was 
adopted  a  few  days  before  I  started  to  St.  Louis,  the  Hon, 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  493 

J.  K.  Richards,  now  Solicitor-General  of  the  United 
States,  then  ex-Attomey-General  of  Ohio,  and  an  inti- 
mate, personal  and  pohtical  friend  of  President  McKin- 
ley,  called  upon  me  at  Cincinnati,  coming  directly  from 
Canton,  where  he  had  been  given  some  resolutions  in 
regard  to  the  money  and  tariff  questions,  which  had  been 
prepared  by  the  friends  of  President  McKinley  with  his 
approval,  and  which  it  was  desired  I  should  take  charge 
of  in  view  of  my  probable  membership  of  the  committee 
on  resolutions,  with  a  view  to  having  them  incorporated 
in  the  platform. 

"When  a  few  days  later  I  went  to  St.  Louis  I  traveled 
with  the  Hon.  Charles  Emory  Smith,  now  Postmaster- 
General,  and  Mr.  Murat  Halstead.  I  showed  them  the 
resolutions  on  the  train,  and  we  were  all  of  the  opinion 
that,  while  they  contained  much  that  was  good,  they 
should  be  more  concise,  more  explicit,  and  not  seek 
to  make  the  tariff  question  paramount,  and  that  if  adopted 
they  should  first  be  corrected  accordingly.  Mr.  Smith 
had  made  a  rough  draft  of  the  material  parts  of  a  plat- 
form, including  a  money  plank.  He  read  it  to  Mr.  Hal- 
stead  and  myself,  and  after  going  over  it  we  were  of  the 
opinion  that,  reserving  the  financial  part  for  further  con- 
sideration, with  very  few  unimportant  changes,  it  would 
be  well  to  adopt  what  he  had  written.  His  money  plank 
read  as  follows: 

"  'Public  and  private  credit,  business  safety  and  con- 
fidence, the  worth  of  wages,  and  the  honor  and  security 
of  all  commercial  intercourse,  depend  upon  a  standard  of 
value  and  a  sound  and  stable  currency.  A  debasement  of 
the  standard  and  consequent  depreciation  of  the  currency 
destroys  faith,  robs  labor,  drives  away  capital,  increases 
the  rates  of  interest,  burdens  the  borrower,  paralyzes 
enterprise,  and  inflicts  incalculable  injury  upon  all  except 
the  money-changers.  Gold,  silver,  and  convertible  paper, 
with  ^very  dollar  of  ^very  kind  constantly  exchangeable 


494   MY  QUARTER  CENTURY  OF 

and  equivalent  to  every  other  dollar,  constitutes  our  estab- 
lished currency.  We  favor  the  use  of  silver  to  the  extent 
at  which  its  parity  with  gold  can  be  maintained;  but  we 
are  opposed  to  the  free,  unlimited,  and  independent  coin- 
age of  silver,  and  to  any  change  in  the  existing  gold 
standard  except  by  international  agreement/ 

"But  however  that  may  be,  it  must  be  manifest  that 
either  Mr.  Kohlsaat  wrote  the  Richards-Hanna  resolutions, 
which  were  adopted  only  in  part,  and  that  part  not  very 
important,  and  which  did  not  explicitly  enough  declare 
for  a  maintenance  of  the  existing  Gold  Standard  to  satisfy 
the  committee,  or  else  he  must  have  written,  in  the  name 
of  somebody  else,  that  part  of  the  plank  that  was  adopted 
which  was  not  taken  from  the  Richards-Hanna  resolu- 
tions. Every  member  of  the  sub-committee  knows  he 
did  not  do,  and  could  not  have  done,  anything  of  the  kind, 
for  that  part  of  the  plank  was  framed,  to  the  personal 
knowledge  of  each  member  of  the  sub-committee  itself, 
from  what  had  been  submitted  to  it  by  others,  and  from 
what  all  its  members  knew  was  required  to  meet  public 
sentiment,  and  was  only  what  all,  except  Senator  Teller, 
were  anxious  to  say  and  would  have  said  had  they  acted 
solely  upon  their  own  judgment  without  the  help  of  out- 
side advice  or  suggestion. 

"It  is  to  be  hoped  that  the  claims  of  Mr.  Kohlsaat  to 
greatness,  and  the  gratitude  of  his  countrymen,  rest  upon 
something  more  substantial  than  the  story  that  he  was 
the  author  of  the  Gold  plank  of  the  Republican  platform 
of  1896;  and  it  is  especially  to  be  hoped  that  his  acquies- 
cence, not  to  say  complicity,  in  the  claim  that  has  been 
made  for  him  in  this  regard  is  not  to  be  taken  as  a  measure 
of  the  virtues  of  that  truly  remarkable  man. 

"This  article  on  the  Gold  plank  prompted  a  great  many 
people  to  write  me  words  of  congratulation  on  account  of 
it.  Most  of  the  letters  I  received  contained  references  to 
Mr.  Kohlsaat,  who  was  at  one  time  connected  in  some 


AMERICAN    POLITICS  495 

way  with  a  bakery,  that  were  so  unkind,  impoHte,  and 
harsh  as  to  be  unprintable  without  the  risk  of  giving  him 
offense,  but  I  received  some  of  mild  character  in  that 
respect,  to  which  he  would  probably  take  no  exception, 
one  of  which  is  the  following: 

Las  Cruces,  N.  M.,  12-6-9. 
"Dear  Governor, — I  am  glad  you  slit  the  gullet  of  that  d — d  pastry 
cook.     His  gall  is  insufferable. 

Yours, 

John  J.  Ingalls." 
Senator  J.  B.  Foraker,  Washington. 


END  OF  VOL.    I 


•%.r    TTO-r? 


F  14  DAY  USE 

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